


Twisting Fate

by throwupsparkles



Category: My Chemical Romance
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst with a Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, M/M, Married Life, Sexual Content, Time Travel...sorta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:28:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 36,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24670846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/throwupsparkles/pseuds/throwupsparkles
Summary: “It’s not bad to want to change the past,” Mikey says quietly, bringing Gerard out of his haunted memories, “It doesn’t mean that you don't appreciate what you have.”“What does it mean then?”Mikey sighs, “That you still love Frank.”******Or the one where Gerard gets sent to an alternate universe where he’s married to Frank and nothing is as it seems. Think “The Family Man”, but instead of Nicholas Cage you get emos.
Relationships: Frank Iero/Gerard Way
Comments: 303
Kudos: 309





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> *gasp* A multi-chapter fic? Who even is she? Look, I've had this idea rambling around for a bit and I think that I want to give it some more breathing room than my usual 20K oneshot. 
> 
> DISCLAIMER: I always get a little weirded out when I have ideas that hit a little closer to real world Frank and Gerard. I typically stay deep in the AU vibes, but this one needed to at least start out in a more realistic setting. Emphasis on *more realistic*. This is still fiction. Please keep that in mind as you read along.

Gerard hasn’t been back to Jersey in years. 

It feels like he’s in a dream at first, that he’s in one of those dreams he used to have on tour all the time. Where nothing really happens, but he’s just walking through his hometown and staring at all the buildings that haven’t been torn down to make shopping centers. 

He had made the decision as a knee jerk reaction, just bought the plane ticket as soon as Frank’s text came through the group chat that he was safe and at home. And alive. 

But now, as the Uber pulled up to Frank’s house, Gerard wasn’t so sure this was a good idea. He hadn’t seen Frank in years. Not since, well. Gerard clears his throat to keep it from closing in on itself. When he gets out, he hugs the tattered grey hoodie that’s become sort of a security blanket tighter to him. He tries not to think about how much he’s changed since Frank saw him last. How he’s basically in a new body. Well, he’s got instagram but Gerard hasn’t really posted since the weight came back on. Since the greys started streaking through his hair. Since he got too tired to shave.

He hears the dogs barking before Gerard even knocks on the door, and it’s enough of a jolt to his heart that he thinks he should turn around and run. But there’s already movement behind the curtain covering the glass of the door. A figure walking towards him, and he can tell it’s Frank. Because even after years of not seeing him, his mind just _knows_ him. Could never forget him. 

Frank slips the curtain to the side to look out and frowns, then opens the door. “Hey,” he says slowly, looking at Gerard like he’s trying to sell him a Bible. 

“Hey,” Gerard breathes, taking him in. Seeing Frank in front of him and not on a computer screen. Seeing him _alive_. Something he didn’t know he’d be able to do again for the few seconds his mind read “accident” and then caught up to the “alright” part of the message. 

Frank holds the door wider and steps off to the side. “Come in, man.”

Gerard walks in slowly and stands in the entryway. Frank’s house looks nothing like his in LA. It still looks like Frank, looks Jersey and unpretentious. 

Frank gives Gerard a look. And it’s a cross between making sure that Gerard is actually here in his home and a “what the fuck?”. Frank shakes his head, a little smile pulling at his lips and he laughs nervously, that squeaky breathy laugh that Gerard could pick out from a crowd easily. He takes a deep breath and exhales loudly. “Yeah, ok,” he says, then walks down the hall.

Gerard follows him after a beat of awkwardly wondering if he’s just supposed to stand there by the door until Frank calls on him like a dog. But he does make his way through the house, eyes sweeping over the photos on the walls, snapshots of moments that he remembers and others, lots of others, that he wasn’t around for. They come into the living room and Frank takes the smaller couch, leaving the bigger one for Gerard to sit in the middle of. And he feels cold. 

“So,” Frank says slowly, “Uh, did you tell me you were coming and I just didn’t--”

“Uh, no,” Gerard rushes, and drags his hand through his hair, tugging at the strands a little and trying not to wince at how greasy they are. “I just sorta...you know, I just…”

“Yeah,” Frank says softly, nodding a little, “I was scared too.”

Gerard closes his eyes. “Yeah, I can’t even imagine.”

“But I’m here, right?” Frank says quickly, “I can’t just, I can’t stay in that moment.”  
  
Gerard nods and opens his eyes. “Yeah,” he says, and ok, he didn’t really think about what he would actually say once he got to this point. He just knew that he had to see Frank. To prove to himself that he was really here. 

“Um,” Frank says, then he shifts a little and laughs again, “Sorry this is fucking weird.”

Gerard feels his face break into a grin and he nods a little too enthusiastically. “Yeah, really weird.”

Frank stares at him, that little hint of mischief still lingering in his eyes, in between the fear of his mortality and the sadness that Gerard is sure he has something to do with. “Why is it? I mean, it’s just us.”

“I think that’s the problem,” Gerard mumbles. 

Frank nods and looks down at his hands. Gerard searches the skin for ink he’s not familiar with. Wants to see what messages he hasn’t deciphered yet. “I know we’ve talked about it…”

They’ve talked about it. Yeah. Late night phone calls where they just listen to each other breathe and then Frank’s small voice, timid like a child’s, “I don’t hate you.” And it was so fucking hopeful. Like Frank’s admission would bring Gerard back to him. Like it was Frank’s fault the band broke up. Like he wasn’t fucking good enough or something. And Gerard would just whisper back, “I know, Frankie.” Because he could never admit that it was him. Couldn’t tell him how bad things had gotten again. Didn’t want to hear Frank say, “I told you so” or “I warned you”. 

“We don’t have to,” Gerard rushes and Frank’s mouth closes and he just nods stiffly.

“Yeah, ok.”

Gerard looks down at his hands and stares at the discoloration that’s still wrapped around his ring finger. 

“Yeah, I heard about that,” Frank says softly, and there’s an air of accusation. Because, yeah, maybe Gerard should have told him. But he didn’t see the reason to. Didn’t want to bring up the conversations that would come from it.

“It’s fine,” Gerard says tightly, and he looks up at him like _say it_. 

Frank stares back and he looks sorry. Like he pities Gerard. And it makes Gerard’s stomach drop, because he was always on the other side of this. He was always the one chased after, always the one that looked at Frank like he was a sad puppy. 

Frank shifts in his seat and sighs, “How long are you here for?”

Gerard blushes a little. “I didn’t really think things out. I had just planned to stay at my parents’. Assuming they recognize me.”

Frank snorts. “You don’t look that different.”

Gerard frowns and looks down at his chubby thighs. “Yeah, ok.”

“Gee,” Frank says, and it’s in that same tone that if Gerard closes his eyes, he’s back in his bunk with Frank pressed against him. But he doesn’t close his eyes, doesn’t want to go back there because it always hurts when he comes back. 

Frank clears his throat and says, “Jamia and the kids are going to be back any minute.”

“Oh, yeah, ok,” Gerard says, starting to get up because Frank had said it in a tone that clearly meant he wasn’t welcomed to stay, “I’ll get going.”

Frank stands up and walks him back to the door. “I’ll call you, ok?”

Gerard hovers by the door and nods. “Yeah, ok.”

Frank mutters, “Fuck,” then pulls Gerard into a hug. 

Gerard almost starts crying as soon as his mind catches up to the fact that he’s in Frank’s arms. As soon as his body stops screaming _home home home_ and he wraps his arms tighter around Frank and presses his face into his inked neck and inhales. _Home home home._

And alive. 

Frank rubs his hand up and down Gerard’s back and squeezes tighter before stepping back. He looks like he’s going to cry too, so Gerard just wipes at his eyes and walks out the door. 

He doesn’t really know what to do because he should have gotten an Uber while he was still at Frank’s. Now he has to walk down the street like a loser because there’s no way he’s just going to sit on Frank’s porch and wait for an Uber. 

His vision is blurred from the tears threatening to fall, but he just keeps walking until he thinks he’s far enough away to escape mortification if he sits on a bench. He pulls out his pack of smokes and lights up, leaning onto his knees and trying to breathe. 

He should call Mikey. This was always when he would call Mikey. But he’s not sure even his brother’s steady voice would be able to soothe the tremors ripping through him. 

“Are you alright?”

Gerard looks up and sees an elderly woman walking this tiny rat looking dog. He smiles politely and nods, “I’m fine, thanks.”

She looks unconvinced and sits next to him, pulling the floral scarf tighter around her coral curls. She sighs like she’s been on her feet all day and pulls out a chocolate bar from her obnoxious purple purse, he kind of loves her already. She breaks it in half and hands it to him. “Here, honey, you look like you need a little sugar.”

And Gerard grins, because it’s so Jersey and he feels like a little kid being taken care of again. Feels like he’s sitting on Elena’s piano bench and telling her about the bad day he had at school. He bites into the rich sugar and lets it melt on his tongue before saying, “Thanks.”

“Girl troubles?” She asks. 

Gerard snorts. “Something like that,” he says, then because he’s always been putty around old ladies he says, “I just saw a friend of mine who was in an accident. And it just made me think about how much I haven’t appreciated him.”

She nods and nibbles at her half of the chocolate bar. “Oh, yeah. Well that’ll do it to you,” She says, then she looks at him, “This friend isn’t just a friend?”

Gerard blushes and grins. “It’s complicated.”

She hums. “Something happened before all of this to make it complicated?”

Gerard thinks that he and Frank were always complicated, but that’s not really true. It was easy before. When they were pressed against each other on stage, when he felt their sweat mix together under hot lights. Easy in the quiet hours of the early morning where they would sit on the bus and whisper the next steps. Where the band was going. Back when they still had dreams. 

But then ProRev happened, and it was never really the same after that. 

So, he nods. 

“You think things would be better if you could change that?” She asks softly. 

And Gerard shrugs. “Yeah, I mean, probably.”

She hums and then stands. “Well, I have to get Snippy back home. She gets testy when we miss our stories,” she says with a smile. 

Gerard grins up at her, feeling just a little bit lighter. “Thanks for the candy.”

She just gives him a knowing smile and walks away. 

*

“I can’t believe you went home without me,” Mikey whines, “Now you’re the favorite son.”

Gerard grins and lays back on his childhood bed and looks over to the other bed where Mikey used to sleep. “I was always the favorite.”

“Not true,” Mikey says, “You stopped being the favorite after you missed Thanksgiving three years in a row.”

Gerard winces at that, but before he can say anything Mikey hurries with, “But you’re there now. What did mom say?”

“She cried then made me a casserole,” Gerard says.

Mikey laughs. “Was it the cheesy potato one? With the corn flakes on top?”

Gerard snorts. “What else?”

Gerard can hear Kristin in the background, hears the screeching and then the sound of little feet running across the floor. And it’s not that Gerard is _jealous_. He’s happy that his brother finally got the happy ending that he deserves. Gerard likes Kristin and he loves the family that she’s created with Mikey. Loves that she’s brightened his eyes back to the Mikey he used to know before the world had beaten him down. 

So he’s not really jealous, because he’s happy for Mikey. But, he just can’t help feel the dull pull of his own heart. Because he doesn’t have that, not anymore. And it didn't used bother him that much, or well, it did, but it wasn’t this constant throbbing that it’s become. Because Lyn-z left him months ago, if anything he should have gotten used to it by now. But it’s like it’s happening to him in reverse. He didn’t care in the beginning because he was still so hyper focused on other projects. On other things that weren’t people who could hurt him. 

When the band broke up, Gerard shut himself into his studio and didn’t come out for months. And then when he did, he hopped on a plane to travel the world. To run away, far, far away from anything that looked like My Chem. And Lyn-z and Bandit got caught into the crossfire. It’s not something he’s proud of. He always thought of himself as better than the divorce rate, especially the divorce rate amongst celebrities. Especially after he saw what it did to Mikey. He wasn’t going to go down that path.

But then he did.

“How is he?” Mikey asks softly.

“He looks good,” Gerard says, then winces at how that sounds, and by the quiet snickers coming from Mikey, he takes it that way. “Shut up, you know what I mean.”

“Uh huh,” Mikey says, then, “It’s good that you went to see him.”

“Is it?” Gerard asks, “It didn’t seem like he was that happy to see me.”

“You probably just surprised him. You two haven’t really talked in three years,” Mikey reminds him, “And it’s not like...well, I mean, there’s some shit between you two.”

Gerard frowns. “Yeah. I’ve been thinking about that a lot recently.”

“Because of Lyn-z?”

Gerard sighs, “I don’t know, maybe?” 

Mikey’s quiet on the other line, waiting for Gerard to continue. Not because he doesn’t already know, but because he knows that Gerard hasn’t really said it out loud. “I don’t regret marrying her.”

“I know that,” Mikey says softly.

“I wouldn’t have Bandit and...I still love her, Mikes.”

“I know.”

“But I just,” Gerard says, then sighs, “Is it so bad to think about what would have happened if that night never happened?”

Gerard doesn’t have to specify what night. Doesn’t have to remind him of the show where he shoved Frank, pushed him away from him and his life. Because that’s what Gerard does when he’s scared. 

“I’m not a fucking phase!” Frank had yelled at him when they got off stage, shoving him into the wall. The other guys quickly made themselves scarce, even the stage crew put down their tasks and disappeared as well. Mikey lingered and stared at Gerard until Gerard had nodded, _it’s ok_. 

And then they had been alone. 

“I know you’re not,” Gerard had said quietly. 

Frank’s hold loosened, but he kept him crowded against the wall. “Then why?”

Gerard shook his head, because he didn’t know. He didn’t know how to tell him that he felt safer with Lyn-z. That she didn’t push him like Frank did. She let him just exist where Frank drove him onto the brink of insanity with his constant drive. 

“You’re more,” Frank had whispered, “You’re more than what she’s trying to water you down into.”

Gerard glared at him. “I love her.”

“You love what she can give you,” Frank spat out.

Gerard shoved Frank back. “Fuck you,” he growled, turning to walk down the hall but Frank caught his wrist and hauled him back to him. And then Gerard kissed him, because he fucking was insane whenever he was around Frank. Didn’t think. Everything was just instinct with him. Just a pull of lips and teeth, hands digging into flesh and breathy moans. 

Frank pushed Gerard back against the wall again and pushed himself against Gerard. And Gerard let himself get lost in it for the last time. Savored the feeling of his chest heaving against his, the hand that wrapped around him and pressed against his lower back, the push of his hips. He breathed in the air that Frank had exhaled, lapped at the sweat on his neck, swallowed his “Gerard”. And then he pushed Frank back and hardened his eyes. 

Frank stared back at him, with his eyes wild and his lips rubbed raw. “You’re going to regret it.”

Gerard had to square his shoulders and walk away or he would have never left Frank and their possibilities in that hallway. 

“It’s not bad to want to change the past,” Mikey says quietly, bringing Gerard out of his haunted memories, “It doesn’t mean that you don’t appreciate what you have.”

“What does it mean then?”

Mikey sighs, “That you still love Frank.”

“That doesn’t really do me any good now,” Gerard mumbles and he gets up to go lay on Mikey’s bed, “You should come fly out here. Get on the next plane, I miss you.”

Mikey laughs gently. “I can’t just hop on planes anymore, Gee.” He doesn’t say _I have a family_ , doesn’t need to say that Gerard isn’t his whole world anymore. 

“Yeah, I know,” Gerard says sadly.

“But when you come back, I’ll carve out a whole Gerard Day,” he says.

Gerard smiles and presses his face against Mikey’s old pillow. It doesn’t smell like him though. It smells stale, like it’s been left out in the cold for too long. Neglected. “Everyday is Mikey Day,” he murmurs.

“Get some sleep, Gee,” Mikey says fondly, “Call me in the morning. Tell me if Mom’s cinnamon pancakes still taste the same.”

“Ok,” Gerard says then, “I love you.”

“Love you too,” Mikey says, then hangs up.

Gerard listens to the dial tone until he falls asleep.

*

Gerard wakes up to something cold and wet pressed against his cheek. He frowns and tries to pull the blanket over his head, but it’s caught on something. And, ugh, this is not how Gerard wanted to wake up after the shitshow that was yesterday. 

And then his cheek is being _licked_. 

Gerard jumps awake and he’s face to face with the ugliest dog he’s ever seen in his life. He scrambled out of bed and realizes that it’s not Mikey’s bed. He’s not even in their room. 

There’s posters all over the wall and for a moment Gerard thinks he’s twenty again and waking up in a stranger’s bed after a bender. But he’s pushing forty and he hasn’t drank in years. So, what the fuck?

He hears pans clamoring and he knows that he should probably get out of here as soon as possible. He watches the dog that woke him up dart out of the room and hears it’s little nails hitting the wooden floor as it scurries down the steps.

Gerard looks around for his phone, but he doesn’t see it and decides that it’s best to just leave it behind. He doesn’t want to run into whoever lives here. He just needs to get out of here and find a phone to call Mikey. 

When he slips down the steps, they creak _so fucking loud_ and he really doesn’t have the chance to sneak out of the door when, “Babe, are you up?”

Frank?

Gerard freezes with his hand hovered over the doorknob. And he realizes that he’s _been_ here before. He was just here yesterday. Oh fuck, what did he _do_ last night?

Frank walks into the hall and grins at him with his eyebrow raised. “Sneaking out?” He teases, walking to him and kissing his forehead, “You haven’t done that since we were kids.”

“Um…” Gerard trails off.

Frank leans back and his eyebrows knit in worry. “Are you ok? You look pale. Please don’t tell me you’re getting sick, I _just_ started feeling better.”

Gerard shakes his head slowly. Frank presses his hand to Gerard’s forehead. “You’re not warm. Come on, I made breakfast. Maybe your blood sugar is just low. You remember what the doctor said about you not eating? How late were you up last night?”

Gerard lets Frank fuss over him as he drags him down the hallway and to the kitchen. Gerard looks at the photos on the wall and chokes a little at how often he appears in the frames this time. 

_What the hell is going on?_

Frank steers him to the table and makes him sit down before handing him a glass of orange juice. “Drink all of that, then I’ll give you your coffee.”

Gerard makes a face. He hates juice, but he sips at it as Frank pokes around the kitchen. He looks the same as he did when he left him yesterday, but this...Gerard doesn’t want to jump to the conclusion that he’s somehow woke up in a different dimension, but he’s seen enough sci-fi to recognize the plot. 

He looks around Frank’s kitchen, smiles at the fact that it’s quaint and not the overly marbled one back at home in LA. He’s got the classic Jersey vinyl countertops and the outdated wooden cabinets. He even has a little sheer white curtain that hangs halfway down the window, the kind that his mom has hanging in her kitchen. 

Frank sets down a plate of something that _looks_ like eggs, but it’s off. It’s way too fucking yellow and there’s a few strips of bacon that looks too stiff and nowhere near greasy enough. Frank laughs at him when he wrinkles his nose at it. 

“Oh come on, it’s been almost ten years,” Frank says, “And don’t act like you don’t like the facon, you’re always the one to eat the last of it and not say anything.”

Ten years?

Gerard pokes his fork at the eggy substance and takes a bit. It’s not bad, but it’s definitely not eggs. “What the hell is this?”

“Tofu scramble,” Frank says slowly, “Did you have a stroke and not tell me?”

Gerard rolls his eyes and takes another bite hesitantly, wondering if he’d be able to feed it to the dog without Frank noticing. 

“What do you want to do about tonight?”

Gerard frowns at him. “Tonight?”

Frank tilts his head to the side. “Yeah...Shaun's birthday.”

Gerard nods. “Right, yeah, um. Whatever is fine,” he says, keeping his answers vague until he can sort through what he’s supposed to be like in this version of his life. Fuck, he needs to call Mikey. He’ll know what to do. “Have you seen my phone?”

Frank snorts, “Yeah, you left it in the studio. I put it on the charger for you because I’m a good husband.”

Husband?  
  
Gerard starts coughing around the facon and reaches for his orange juice.

“Jesus,” Frank says, coming around to pat his back. “Are you sure you’re ok?”

No, he’s not. Not at all. Because this can’t be real. He must still be dreaming, but even in his wildest dreams he never dared to have this with Frank. This sort of blissful domesticity where they sit at a kitchen table and eat breakfast while talking about a friend’s birthday party. Where they’re apparently a “we” now and they make game plans before going out for the evening. Where he’s in those pictures with Frank instead of just a bystander. 

Gerard takes a sip from his orange juice and notices the ring on his finger. His hand is shaky as he sets the glass down and stares at the simple silver band. Simple, but holding so much meaning. 

“Babe?” Frank asks, rubbing his shoulders. 

“Fine,” Gerard whispers, reaching up to take his hand and squeeze. 

Definitely real. 

“I’m fine,” Gerard whispers. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I thought that was kinda the point,” Gerard says, remembering some of the theories he’s discussed with Grant, “the world was born from chaos.”
> 
> “No, honey,” she says with a smile, “That’s just what people who’ve done too many drugs think.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part of the reason I'm horrible at multi-chapter fics is that I get too excited and upload pretty frequently, and I'm not sure if that's annoying? I know most people upload like once a week or something, but I'm still home from work for another two weeks so all I do is write.
> 
> Thank you to everyone who left comments on the last chapter! I'm so excited that you all are ready to go on this ride. <3

The thing that’s tripping Gerard up the most about this whole ordeal, well, besides the being married to Frank bit, is his closet. He’s been standing in front of it for probably a good twenty minutes just staring at all the clothes he has. 

After he had convinced Frank that he didn’t need to rush Gerard to an emergency room to check for amnesia or a stroke, he had told him that he needed to head into the studio with Evan for a bit. Gerard tilted his head at the name, but didn’t say anything. He didn’t want to have to talk Frank off the ledge again. 

Instead he started poking around the house as soon as Frank left. Kissing him goodbye was weird and perfect all at once. Because he felt like his Frankie, but he was different somehow. This was the Frank that Gerard didn’t grow up with. He had laugh lines on his face that Gerard was sure he hadn’t put there, but as he pressed Frank against the front door and licked at them, he swore that he’d be the reason that Frank laughed from now on. 

Gerard had started with their bedroom first, thinking it would offer the most clues. But that’s how he got stuck in front of the closet. 

He runs his hands over the fabrics, nothing too extravagant but still sturdier than the fabrics he’d been wearing lately. They looked like him, like he actually held them out in the store and considered them before purchasing instead of hiding in his studio and just ordering the bare minimum online. His closet looked like he still enjoyed shopping. It was something he loved to do when he was younger. He remembers all the jackets that would accumulate over the many miles they traveled for Black Parade. Oh God, he remembers that stupid pimp coat he had bought during Revenge. It was his first real impulse purchase, he couldn’t imagine spending that much on a coat now, and all the guys had laughed at him. At least he had the decency to not wear it when he had that stupid cane later during Black Parade. That would have really driven the kids wild. 

He digs through the clothes and ungodly amount of shoes, but he doesn’t really find anything that tells him much about himself in this...world? Dimension? Timeline? Plane of existence? He hadn’t read enough Douglas Adams to really piece this together yet. He needed Mikey.

Phone.

Gerard searches the room for his phone that Frank had put on the charger for him. He sees it on the night table, and smiles a little that it’s the newest iPhone. It had been awhile since Gerard got excited about little things like new Apple releases. His smile stretches when he realizes that his passcode is still Mikey’s birthday and then he dials Mikey quickly. 

But of course he doesn’t answer. He never does. For a kid that’s always on his phone, he sure has a hard time returning phone calls. Well, he’s got the baby now so Gerard lets it pass more than he used to. Plus once he does get Mikey on the phone they usually eat up about three hours, so it’s sort of understandable that he waits to call back when he can. 

He leaves a voicemail, because he’s almost forty and people over the age of thirty still believe in voicemail. Though, he’s sure Mikey won’t even listen to it. He’ll just call Gerard back and have no clue why Gerard called in the first place. Sometimes Mikey really drives Gerard up the wall. 

He gets a little distracted with his phone. Checking text messages, but there’s nothing all that telling in them. Mostly just texts to Ray about barbecuing and a few to Gabriel about Umbrella Academy. Oh, well at least that’s still a thing wherever it is that Gerard is at. 

What he’s not really prepared for is the lack of photos of Bandit in his camera roll, and well...yeah. That would make sense if he and Frank had been together for almost ten years right? Still, something in Gerard’s heart sort of dies. Because he’d never trade her to be with Frank, not in a million years. And he feels this sharper pain now, this strangling pressure weighing on him because he wasted so much time with her. He took so much time for granted. All the early years when he was still with My Chem, and then later when the band broke and he hid away. There’s so much that he had missed, but he always thought that in the back of his head he’d have time to make up for it. But now that’s not a possibility for him anymore. 

His hand shakes as he puts the phone back on the table and he gets up to go sort through the rest of the house. Maybe there’s some sort of lesson in all this. That’s what a lot of these movies and books are like, right? There’s a reason why he was sent here, he just needs to find it and then go back to his daughter. 

The pictures in the hall offer some sort of clues, though he’s not familiar with some of the locations. There’s one that’s of him and the guys from the band, but they’re older than when the band broke up in 2013 which makes him wonder if they’re still together. Maybe Evan is a new drummer? God knows they’ve been through plenty of those. The next few are just of him and Frank in various situations, one from a holiday party it looks like given the Christmas tree, another from some beach where Gerard apparently feels confident enough to not wear a shirt, and then one of just a close up of their faces. 

And then Gerard stops at one that’s very clearly a wedding photo. An actual wedding photo, not a rushed affair backstage in denim jackets. Not that he would ever take back that night with Lyn-Z, that wasn’t the point. It’s just that sometimes he wonders if they rushed it. And why did they rush it. And Gerard groans, because he _knows_ why he rushed them. But the photo with Frank is clearly intentional. It’s not stuffy looking even though they’re both wearing suits, not tuxes. He remembers how much Frank hated tuxes. But they look really nice. Young and hopeful, their eyes still bright even after all that they had seen at that point. Gerard takes the photo down and opens the frame, wondering if the Gerard from this time still dates his photos...and yeah, he did. Gerard grins, 2009. He hums, well they waited until the tour was over to get married at least. He hangs it back up and just stares at it for a bit, but then moves on before he lets it settle too long in his mind. 

The living room doesn’t offer much, it just has random magazines and knick knacks all over the place. Silly superhero figurines, books that Gerard would have normally kept in his studio, and a sketchbook with a set of colored pencils sitting on top. Gerard frowns, he normally kept all of this stuff locked away in a studio. He always made sure to keep this part of his life separate from his “real” life. He sits down on the same couch he sat on yesterday and pulls the sketchbook into his lap. 

They’re definitely his, but again, there’s something off about them. They’re a little more carefree, not as down to the gritty detail. Almost drawn as if these were just for fun instead of for a project. Like he had sketched these while watching game shows with Frank or something, and it stuns him a little how quickly he yearns for that. Just that simple, breathable kind of living. 

Gerard sets it back on the coffee table and finds a set of stairs leading down. _This has to be a studio_ , he thinks. And he’s right, but it’s not quite what he thought it would be. It’s not rigid at all. It mostly looks like an adult playroom with lots of instruments laying around and comic books thrown across the various flat surfaces. The walls are sound proofed and there’s definitely recording equipment to make some demos or whatever, but it’s nothing serious. And Gerard feels so relaxed in here.

He walks over to what’s surely his desk and sees various papers with drawings at different stages. There’s some Umbrella Academy stuff, but there’s just some silly stuff that he hasn’t let leak from his mind since he was trapped in a tour bus. And, just because he can’t help it, he logs into the laptop that’s sitting on the table. He’s a bit surprised that the password is Mikey’s birthday still since it’s clearly shared between the two of them, but he’s glad he was able to get in. He clicks around at the different demos that are pulled up and they’re Frank singing. Stuff for his band, it sounds like that kind of style. But the lyrics are different. 

He pulls up google and Spotify and dives into listening to the album he thought he already knew by heart, and instead relearns it and the lyrics. They’re so much lighter. When Frank’s first album came up under The Celebration, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to make it through because there was just so much of them in it. But after awhile, it was like he put it on just to torture himself. And also, just to hear how much someone out there loved him, even if it was twisted and ruined. It was still there. 

But this version of the album is different. There’s still references to the band, and ok, he’s pretty sure the band still breaks up. There’s a lot about things that Frank’s only whispered to Gerard when he thought he was sleeping back when they would share bunks. Back when the world was too scary to go at it alone but Gerard was still brave enough to face it with Frank. 

Gerard doesn’t even notice Frank walking down the steps with their rat dog thing until he’s standing in front of him, leaning against the desk with a quirked brow. “Whatcha doing?”

Gerard blushes and pauses the song he was on, looking up at him like he was caught snooping through porn instead of Frank’s music. “Nothing,” he mumbles. 

Frank laughs softly and sets the dog down before sliding into Gerard’s lap, wrapping his hands around Gerard’s neck. “Now,” Frank murmurs with a wicked grin, “Why don’t I believe you?”

“Because we’ve been married for seven years,” Gerard breathes. 

Frank nods and leans in to just hover his lips over Gerard’s. “And here I was thinking you were going senile,” he says, his breath kissing him instead. 

Gerard grins. “That’s still debatable.”

Frank laughs and then kisses him with a smile still on his lips. And Gerard forgot that kissing could be silly like this. That it wasn’t just pecks of goodbyes or the build up to sex. He forgot that Frank could make it an experience all in itself. With breathy laughter leaking into his mouth and nips of the upturned corners of his lips. That he could feel light, light, light like he could float up to the ceiling and stare down at their bodies existing with ease. That it could be this _easy_. There was no pressure, no questioning, no guilt. Just kissing. 

Gerard hasn’t just kissed anyone in years. 

“I need you to walk Killer while I take a shower,” Frank murmurs against his lips before pulling away. 

Gerard frowns. “The dog?”

Frank laughs. “Yes, babe, the dog. You know, the one that _you_ brought home. I begged and begged you for a dog and you kept saying that you weren’t a dog person. And then you bring home the ugliest thing I’ve ever seen.”

Gerard gives the dog a look, “I feel like you’re remembering things wrong.”

Frank rolls his eyes and leans down to kiss his forehead. “You’re not getting out of this one. You had all day to shower, but I’m sure you just fiddled around down here like you always do”--Gerard winces a little at that-- “Go take her for a walk. If you’re quick about it, you might be able to jump in and help me finish.” Frank gives him a wink and walks back up the steps with an exaggerated sway of his hips. 

Gerard chuckles softly and shakes his head, but before he can get too far into his shower Frank fantasies, Killer barks at him. Gerard looks down at her and frowns. “I really don’t think I’d bring you home. You don’t seem like you like me at all.”

Gerard reaches down to pick her up and Killer just nips at his fingers. 

“Ow! You dick,” he grumbles, then he squats down to get closer to her eye level. He watches as she eyes him, sniffling at him like she knows him but then scoots back and tilts her head. “You know I’m not your Gerard, don’t you?”

Killer just huffs and sits down, looking unimpressed. 

“Look, why don’t you just play nice until I can figure out how to get back to my time,” he says, and he knows how fucking stupid he looks hunched down and talking to a rat dog, “And then you can have your Gerard back, or...however this works.”

Killer still doesn’t look convinced, but she doesn’t bite him when he picks her up and he thinks that’s a pretty good sign. He wonders through the house until he finds her leash hanging in the kitchen closet. Killer gives him a look like, _what a fucking idiot_. And Gerard sighs, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, I’m still figuring things out.”

He gets her all hooked up and then walks out the front door. And it’s a weird sort of deja vu moment, only this time he isn’t running away from rejection and mortification. This time he takes a slow stroll, watching Killer sniff everything they pass. When he approaches the bench he had his little breakdown on, he sees the same old lady sitting by herself. 

She grins at him as he comes closer and then Killer goes wild and pulls out of his hands and jumps up into her lap. “Oh, I’m so sor--” but he stops because that's the dog that she was walking yesterday. 

_What the fuck?_

This is just getting weirder and weirder. 

“You look like you could use a seat,” she says with a smile, patting the space next to her. 

“Yeah,” he breathes, sitting down and frowning. 

“Is it everything you thought it would be?” She asks lightly, stroking Killer’s back.

Gerard freezes, then turns to look at her and takes in her knowing smile. “You did this?”

She shrugs and pulls out a vintage cigarette case. She slips out a cigarette and puts it between her bright pink lips. “Have you got a light?”

Gerard nods quickly and fumbles a lighter out of his pocket and lights her cigarette before lighting one for himself. 

“What questions do you have?” She asks, blowing smoke. 

“A million,” Gerard sighs. 

“Start with the obvious and then we’ll work from there.”

Gerard frowns, the obvious? She lets him struggle with that for a moment, then smiles when he asks, “Am I in another dimension?”

“Time is very finicky,” she says, waving her cigarette around and Gerard loves that she talks with her hands like he does, “every action causes a reaction, right?”--Gerard nods-- “It’s the same with time. Each decision you come to has multiple timelines that are possible, but you only see the one that is a reaction to your choice.”

Gerard takes another drag and asks, “So what’s the choice that I made differently?”

She beams at him, proud that he’s apparently catching on quickly. “Whatever made things complicated for you and your friend.”

ProRev. 

“Oh,” Gerard breathes, a little stunned. Well, yeah, that would make sense...and he’s a little peeved at himself for not piecing that together himself. “Yeah, Ok.”

She smiles. “What else?”

“Um,” he says, furrowing his brow, “I don’t really understand how this works I guess. Is this just my life now, or can I go back?”

She purses her lips and stares at him for a moment. “Do you want to go back?”

Gerard frowns and nods. “My daughter…”

“Why don’t you just give this timeline a try,” She says gently, patting his knee, “Give it a week and then you can decide if you want to go back.”

Gerard shakes his head. “No you don’t understand, my daughter isn’t here. I don’t want this life without--”

“You’ve been without her for months before,” she says, cutting him off, “you can manage a week. I think you’ll be surprised to see how things are played out in this timeline.”

Gerard ashes and sits back against the bench. “What do you mean?”

She shrugs. “Your decision didn’t just affect your timeline. Give this one a shot, see what you gained...and what you lost and weigh the options. What makes you more happy?”

“Bandit--”

“Don’t make any rash decisions,” she says sternly, sounding just like a strict grandmother, “if you still want to go back in a week, then I will take you back.”

Gerard works his way through half his cigarette before he asks, “What’s going on in the timeline I left?”

She smiles. “Don’t worry about that.”

Gerad frowns. “What do you mean?”

She sighs, “Well if you’re here, then that timeline doesn’t exist anymore, at least while you’re here. If you decide to go back, then this timeline won’t exist. Contrary to popular belief there’s not multiple timelines happening at the same time. That would make the world too chaotic.”

“I thought that was kinda the point,” Gerard says, remembering some of the theories he’s discussed with Grant, “the world was born from chaos.”

“No, honey,” she says with a smile, “That’s just what people who’ve done too many drugs think.”

*

Gerard doesn’t make it back in time to hop in the shower with Frank, and he’s a little relieved. He’s not sure he can handle seeing Frank naked like this. As his husband.

_Husband_.

He’s someone’s husband again, and that’s sort of freaking Gerard out. Even more so that it’s Frank. 

Killer bounces right to Frank as soon as they get inside. Frank is standing in front of his closet with a towel wrapped around his waist, and, _fuck_. Gerard’s seen the instagram photos and the photos online, but seeing him with all the tattoos without the barrier of a screen between them is something else entirely. There’s so much ink, and so dark and glistening under the water droplets that still cling to his skin. Gerard just wants to go up to him and lick every new tattoo that he hasn’t been able to properly become acquainted with.

The realization that he _can_ washes over him in warm, gentle laps of water. Coaxing. _He’s yours_. So, Gerard walks over to him and presses a kiss to his shoulder then kisses up to the pair of scissors on his neck. Frank sighs softly and tilts his head to the side. Gerard licks down the length and nibbles at his collarbone, hands tracing down his sides. When his hands come to the knot that’s holding his towel up Frank chuckles gently and covers his hands. 

“As much as I would love to see where this goes,” he murmurs, “We don’t have the time. And”--he sniffs at Gerard and smiles, shaking his head-- “no offense, but you need a shower.”

Gerard pouts against him and Frank turns, still shaking his head. “Hey, you took your sweet time out there with Killer. We could have had shower sexy time.”

Gerard laughs and starts towards the shower. “Whatever.”

He turns on the water and takes the time to go through their medicine cabinets while the water is heating up. Most of what they have is pretty harmless, B12 pills for Frank’s vegan diet, melatonin that Gerard is sure if for the nights he stays up too late in the studio, and the bottle of Xanax that he takes when he flies. And then there’s bottles of aspirin and allergy medicine. But then there’s also a bottle of Prozac and a bottle of Propranolol with his name on it. 

He frowns and gets into the shower, letting the water and new information wash over him. He’s no stranger to antidepressants, but it’s something that he had a strong distaste for when he was younger. And, he sort of grew out of that once the band broke up and he had the time to really revisit his mental health. But the Propranolol really throws him off. He’s never had panic attacks in the past, no PTSD even though he’s been through some shit. 

“Babe, shower time not contemplation time,” Frank says, walking in. Gerard hears the blow dryer and having him in the room with him while he’s spiraling is helpful, just like it used to be. Frank was always his safety harness when things got too wild. 

Gerard wrinkles his nose at the soap that’s in the shower rack. It’s goopy and smells like too many herbs were smashed together. He picks up the bottle and rolls his eyes at the vegan and cruelty free labels, but what did he really expect? He didn’t really expect them to boast about being _“biodegradable and free of chemicals!”_ Even their bar of soap smells like a hippie’s asscrack, but Gerard just lathers up and hurries to turn off the water. 

The blow dryer is still running, meaning Frank is still standing in the bathroom and Gerard doesn’t have a towel in reach to cover himself before he steps out of the shower. Which logically, Gerard knows that Frank has seen him naked loads of times. But, not this Gerard. Not this self-conscious Gerard who hasn’t felt comfortable in his body since he was starving himself during Danger Days. And that was all sorts of fucked up. He can’t think of a time where he was comfortable with his body. 

“Are you just going to air dry in there?” Frank asks when the blow dryer stops. 

“Can you pick something for me to wear?” Gerard asks, hoping it’ll get Frank out of the room. 

“Seriously?”

“Please.” And Gerard’s a little embarrassed at how soft and sad it comes out of his mouth.

There’s a long pause before he hears the telltale signs of Frank leaving the room. He sighs and opens the shower curtain and steps out. He wraps himself in a towel and stands in front of the mirror. He looks like himself from his own timeline, maybe not as many grey strands yet and the hollows under his eyes don’t look quite as dark. And he wonders what other differences his body has. There’s still that burn mark from when he grabbed Mikey’s straightener, a few wonky marks along his knee from the Famous Last Words shoot, and the small scar from slashing his finger open with a guitar string. But the crooked scar on his foot from stepping on Bandit’s Legos is gone.

The wave of missing his daughter threatens to pull him under, but he just reminds himself _it’s just a week_. 

“Alright,” Frank says, walking back in. He sets down a pair of boxers with some skinny jeans and a dark t-shirt. He looks up at Gerard with gentle understanding, without question at all for his glaring insecurity. Because this man knows him. Has known him since they were kids playing VFW halls and hasn’t given up on him in all these years. And he wonders what had to have happened that night during ProRev to put them in this spot. What did Gerard do differently that made this man his? “We’ve got skinny jeans and a nice comfy band tee. How’d I do?”

How did he convince Frank that he was worth all the headache? All the uncertainty and self disdain. How did he trick this beautiful human into loving this mess of bones and thin skin?

“Perfect,” Gerard says, feeling his throat close in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So next chapter is the birthday party. Predictions on who Gerard is going to run into?


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Gerard,” Frank says roughly, pulling at his chin so that he has to look at him, “I always saw you past the act.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The excitement and support I've gotten for this fic is unbelievable, thank you so much guys <3

Gerard’s not sure what he expected from the birthday party, but he’s glad it's a low key affair. They’re in a rented out bowling alley that has a huge bar in the back and lots of neon lights painting colors over them. It’s sort of perfect and Gerard really appreciates the atmosphere. Likes that there’s nothing but processed cheese and deep fried foods scattered among the tables. He even likes that everything smells like cheap beer, and he’s happy that the scent doesn’t punch him in the gut like it used to. 

At least in his timeline it’s not an issue anymore. He’s not sure what this Gerard’s struggle is with alcohol still. If he relapsed in 2010 as well or if this Gerard is stronger than he was. He still remembers the look on everyone’s face when he started drinking. It was just small glasses of wine at dinner, and he got an eyebrow raise from Mikey. But he didn’t say anything, maybe because he was battling his own addictions. That was the problem with the Way brothers, they never quite shook that “chemical brothers” label. It still had its ghostly hand wrapped around their necks, invisible to everyone else but suffocating to them. 

Then the wine at dinner turned into a beer before a show as well, and Ray watched him as he tuned up like he wanted to say something. But he didn’t. Gerard could feel the tension, the worry, the “this is going to ruin the band” hanging in the air. And it wasn’t until Gerard had gotten drunk again that Frank spoke up. He remembers Frank’s hands stroking his cheeks, pushing back his crazed fire engine red hair and whispering, “You promised me.”

“You good?” Frank asks softly, pressing his lips behind his ear. To anyone looking, it looks like Frank’s just giving him a kiss. 

Gerard nods slowly, feeling a little out on a limb without knowing what his history here is. The older lady on the bench had told him that his timeline wouldn’t be the only one changed. And that makes sense, if he married Frank then Lyn-z’s life is totally different. He wonders if they’re even still friends, if they ended things amicably or if there was a big blow out?

And it would be really great to know what his relationship with the band is. Well, with Ray at least. How did the band end and when did it end? And, fuck, Gerard probably should have spent some time googling the band’s history past 2007.

“Breathe,” Frank whispers, kissing his cheek, “We’ll just make the rounds and say happy birthday, then we’ll leave like we talked about, ok?”

Gerard knows he’s not big on crowds, but it seems like in this timeline, he _really_ doesn’t like crowds. So, Gerard just nods and plays along. He takes the hand that Frank offers, not complaining about being babied if it means he gets to be glued to Frank’s side all night. 

There’s people that come up to talk to him like they’re best friends. People that Gerard doesn’t really know. They’re people that Frank’s met through his projects and if they pick up on Gerard’s awkwardness, they don’t say anything. Mostly Gerard lets Frank do the talking, which seems like the normal thing to do since Frank doesn’t push Gerard or anything. 

Frank gets them club sodas loaded up with limes to sip on as they chat to people Gerard either doesn’t know or only slightly remembers. It’s sort of a punch in the gut at how much his friend group has changed in his own timeline. Because after he and Lyn-z got married, he formed new friend circles. Something that meshed her life and his, because that’s what marriage is right? Only now, looking across the room at all these people he used to know, he’s not sure that’s what he should have done. Because after the divorce, none of these people were still in his life to fill the gaps.

“Woah,” he hears, and he turns and almost falls to his knees because it’s fucking Bert. Bert who looks nothing like the one he spent hours pressed against in tour vans and closets in venues. His hair is cropped short and blond, his eyes look brighter and his smile looks a little looser. But he still has that glint of charisma that always drove straight through Gerard, hit him in all the places that mattered. “You’re out and about.”

Frank’s hand tightens around Gerard’s hand, and he wonders what that’s about. “Um, yeah,” Gerard says softly. 

Bert just grins, that wide one that would have made Gerard feel uneasy if he didn’t know Bert’s heart. Bert reaches out and pulls Gerard into a hug, pressing his palm into his back and the other cradling the back of his head. “Good for you, man,” he breathes, then lets go. 

Gerard hasn’t hugged Bert in over a decade, ever since the rift between them. And it was one of those messy things where Gerard isn’t even sure why they stopped being friends. Misunderstandings, he’s sure, what with the fast success of MCR and how quickly Gerard got swept up in it. Not to mention he needed to shut himself away from any temptation when he was trying to get clean. He sort of pissed a lot of people off when he secluded himself in the van during Warped. He was no longer the fun guy that everyone laughed at while he puked in bushes. He was a glaring image of what they all could become if they didn’t keep the demons at bay.

Bert clapped his shoulder, “We should catch up sometime.”

Gerard nods. “Yeah, sure.”

And then Bert is gone. Somehow that part doesn’t surprise Gerard. Bert always moved like a hurricane, sweeping and thunderous only to leave everyone to deal with the fallout. Frank tugs on Gerard’s hand. “Still good?”

Gerard looks at him and nods, but says, “I think I’m ready to go home.”

And it should worry him, should make him question what happened in this timeline for everyone to just accept that Gerard is ready to go home after an hour. Before Shaun even made it to his own party. No one says anything mean, no one jokes, or says “come on, we’ve barely talked!” Frank makes a sweeping round of goodbyes and then they’re back in the car before Gerard even had time to spill something on his shirt. 

There’s no tension on the drive home. Frank’s not mad that Gerard wanted to leave early, and it’s not like Lyn-z ever made him feel guilty for wanting to hermit into his house when she wanted to go out. But, she always looked so sad on the drive home that it made Gerard wish he wasn’t how he was. 

Frank looks over at Gerard and smiles at him like nothings wrong. “Want to get burritos?”

*

They end up pulling up to the airport after Frank grabs them burritos from a drive thru that Gerard hasn’t heard of. He tries to keep his expression blank as Frank parks the car and gets out. Gerard gets out as well and then grins when he sees Frank sit on the hood of the car and lean back against the windshield.

Gerard gets up and sits next to him, accepting the warmed tin foil bundle he hands him. 

“Alright,” Frank says, after taking a bite, “You first.”

Gerard furrows his brow, but says, “No, you.” Because he wants to know what the hell they’re even doing here. 

Frank rolls his eyes and takes a sip from his Mexican Cola. “Fine, even though I went first last time….” he sighs and looks up over them and waits until he sees a plane fly over them. “Alright, that one is going to France. There’s a twentysomething year old girl who’s going there because she thinks it’ll make her a better artist and she’ll fall in love in Paris like a stupid cliche.”

Gerard nods, starting to understand the game. “Yeah, but once she gets there she gets so immersed into her artwork because she’s so inspired...she does...watercolors, yeah, and she doesn’t even realize she has a secret admirer who watches her paint in Parc des Buttes-Chaumont. And he...no, _she_ ”--Frank grins around his burrito-- “keeps trying to work up the courage to talk to our painter, but she doesn’t want to interrupt her. Because at this point she’s almost unsure if she’s in love with the painter or the painting.”

Frank whistles. “See, this is why you always should go first.”

Gerard laughs and takes a bite of his burrito, then quiets a little and asks, “Did you love me first, or the singer?”

Frank stares at him like he asked him if he believed that killing kittens on Thursday sounds like a good idea. “Gee, are you kidding me?”

Gerard frowns, because he’s not. He knows what the price of fame was, and how it tore him down even to this day. Knows what it’s like to look out into the crowd and see the signs that say they love him, sees the shirts with his face on it, sees the shit they post on the internet. But it’s not _him_. It’s the persona he’s created. They love the demolition lover, the self-destructing rockstar, the patient, the killjoy. They don’t love Gerard because they don’t even know him. 

And it would be one thing if it was just the fans. If it was only them he had to question, but it was the crew that surrounded them. Stage crew that talked that they were family, but at the end of the day were employees in a large scale production. To them, he was their money maker. To the corporate sharks, he was nothing but a merchandise being wrung out over and over to fill their pockets. 

And he could even handle it if it was just the fans and the business side of the band that he doubted. It’s expected. He’s a fucking rockstar and this is his job. And really, he could work through it, but it wasn’t just that. It was his “friends”. It was the people who only talked to him because of the publicity. It was the girlfriends that stayed with him so that they could have their pictures posted on the internet. It had gotten to the point where he even questioned Lyn-z sometimes. It wasn’t like she had anything to really gain, she was in a band as well. It wasn’t the money that he questioned at all. He just wondered if she fell in love with the image he was constantly plastering over his face like the makeup he caked on so thick, his pores and thoughts wouldn’t show through. And then when it was all over, when he wiped the makeup and showed her the real him, she couldn’t see the man she loved anymore. 

He knows that’s not all that was there. It wasn’t the only reason they divorced, he knows he has to accept a lot of the blame from hiding. But how was he supposed to stand under her inquisitive stare when she was supposed to already know him? 

“Gerard,” Frank says roughly, pulling at his chin so that he has to look at him, “I always saw you past the act.”

Gerard surges forward and kisses Frank, thinking back to when they were kids things were so much easier. When they would kiss on the carpeted living rooms of random houses that they would find themselves in after those VFW shows. Before the doubts and the heartache, before Gerard lied and told Frank that he didn’t want him. 

_But that didn’t happen here_ , he reminds himself. He’s aware of Frank’s drink being knocked over and one of his legs is soaked, but he’s shifting and determined to land in Frank’s lap. Frank doesn’t seem concerned with the mess either, just cups Gerard’s ass and drags him over his growing hardness. Gerard would gasp if he could afford the air loss, but he doesn’t want to waste a second from Frank’s lips. From Frank’s tongue. 

“So stupid,” Frank mutters, pulling Gerard’s hair and tilting his face towards the sky. 

He opens his eyes and takes in shaky breathes as Frank kisses down Gerard’s neck. He stares at the stars, dim under the lights of the airport, knowing that these are the same stars that he saw in 2001 when he started the band. The same stars that he saw in 2007 when he altered his fate without knowing. The same stars he’s seen in another version of this same year. All stagnant and unwavering. 

The same unwavering love that he’s always had for Frank. Under any circumstance, he never doubted his love for this man. 

Gerard’s head snaps forward as Frank grinds against him, the hot friction pulling at his stomach like there’s this invisible string between him and Frank. This string that Frank constantly has a hold of, and pulls, pulls, pulls until Gerard’s not even in tune with his own body. It’s Frank’s as far as he’s concerned. It’s always been Frank’s. 

Gerard rests his head on Frank’s shoulder, babbling nonsense that he’d be embarrassed of if he took the time to decipher. Frank is no better, just gripping Gerard’s ass and moving them on the hood of the car, making these breathy moans that Gerard hasn’t heard in years. But they lick up his neurons, waking them up from a decade long slumber. 

When he comes it’s unexpected and dizzying, sending him down in waves of pleasure that rip through his body like aftershocks. Frank presses soft kisses along his jaw and whispers, “I’ve got you, baby.”

Gerard’s sort of pissed that he missed Frank’s own orgasm, but he drinks in the soft pink glow lighting up Frank’s cheeks. 

“I can’t believe we just got off in our pants like a bunch of teenagers,” Frank grins, nipping at his jaw. 

Gerard can. He hasn’t had an orgasm that wasn’t a direct result of his laptop and his hand in years. 

“Yeah, well, you know how I am with planes,” Gerard mutters, sinking down into Frank’s embrace. He means it as a joke, but then he remembers the time he and Frank exchanged blow jobs in the plane bathroom on the way to New Zealand. 

“Yeah, I know,” Frank says, like he’s thinking about the same thing.

*

They played a few more rounds of the plane game while they finished their burritos before Frank started complaining about the stickiness of his jeans. Which, whatever, Gerard had soda and cum in his jeans. 

But he let Frank take him back home and throw pajama pants at him. He tried not to notice the way Frank quirked his eyebrow when Gerard scurried into the bathroom to change. Frank doesn’t say anything though, just pulls Gerard to bed when he gets out and then wraps his limbs around him like his an octopus. Gerard laughs and struggles a bit as Frank puts on the TV, flipping through channels before settling on one of those horrible ghost hunting shows. 

They don’t even make it through a full episode before Frank is snoring, and he really was never one to stay up late unless they had played a show. Gerard slips out of his limp hold gently then makes his way quietly as possible down the stairs. When they creak, he freezes and listens for any signals that Frank has woken up, then continues down to the studio after he’s sure it’s safe. 

He goes straight to the laptop and keys it up before pulling up Google. The first search pours out of his fingertips before his brain catches up. _When did MCR breakup?_

Gerard closes his eyes as he hits enter and reminds himself that it can’t be any worse than how he lived it. Couldn’t be any worse than his brother calling him and crying, sobbing that the band was his whole life and how could Gerard take that from him?

“I did it for you too,” Gerard had whispered, “We all knew it was time, I’m just the one who finally spoke up.”

“No,” Mikey said, his voice shaky from the sobs ripping at his vocal chords, “You just don’t want to put the work in.”

“Excuse me?”

“You fucked up and you don’t want to go through what you did before.”

“You’re so fucking selfish,” Gerard hissed, “I can’t believe you would say that--”

“--selfish? You’re the one who started drinking again!--”

“--about that! That whole Pedicone thing--”

“That’s not what this is about and you know it,” Mikey had growled. And Gerard had only heard Mikey use that tone of voice on him a handful of times. 

Gerard had sighed and said, “I can’t keep going, Mikes. This band is going to kill me.”

“It was supposed to save us,” Mikey had whispered.

And it was. It _did_. At least in the beginning when Gerard didn’t have a future at all. Back when he pushed paper through a copy machine all day and watched his brother float aimlessly from party to party. 

He hadn’t washed the ash from his hair for days after he came home from New York that morning in 2001. He just sat in the basement and wrote until his fingers were covered in ink and the screams were replaced by guitar riffs and belting vocals. Didn’t stop until Mikey had pulled him away from his desk and laid him out on his bed, holding his head to his chest. 

Gerard remembers wondering if he could write the drums to the rhythm of Mikey’s heartbeats. Remembers how tightly Mikey held him until Gerard realized he had been shaking and then melted into his embrace. Until he remembered that Mikey’s arms were his arms, that his slow, calm breaths, were his and he settled down enough to tell him, “I have an idea.”

Gerard wipes at his eyes as he opens them and stares at the date. 

May 28, 2008.

Just a few weeks after Madison Square Garden. And, huh. Yeah, that makes sense. That was when he thought the band was going to break up, when it _should_ have broken up. Because they all had achieved what they wanted with the band. Gerard had said all that he needed to say. He had pulled himself out of his parent’s basement and stood on the same stage that he watched with Mikey when they were kids and he whispered, “That’ll be us one day.” 

That day had come.

But he remembers the look on Mikey’s face as they walked off stage, that this couldn’t be the end for him. Somehow Mikey hadn’t come to the finish line at the same time Gerard did. So he did what he always did, and pulled back to wait for Mikey to catch up. 

Gerard clicks through a few articles that basically reiterate the same thing. That the band had parted on good terms and they were all still friends. Which seemed to be true if the photos in Frank’s hall and the texts in Gerard’s phone meant anything. 

But he wondered if Mikey had the same teary call with Gerard, begging him to reconsider. He wonders if that haunted look still washed over Mikey’s face as they walked off stage. 

He frowns and pulls out his phone to dial him again, but he just gets voicemail. Which, ok, makes sense since it’s the middle of the night. He sighs and turns his ringer on in case Mikey does decide to give him a call back. 

Gerard finds himself on Instagram scrolling through his profile. They’re mostly photos of him and Frank doing various things. Some of the photos are of food or random pop culture references, a few comic books. A lot of promotion for Umbrella Academy. And then the further he goes, he sees photos of him and Mikey. And Mikey looks the same, has that same stupid haircut that Gerard had made fun of at first. 

Gerard clicks over to Mikey’s profile and grins at all the photos with him in a Dodgers’ hat. Sometimes he still can’t believe how quickly Mikey adjusted to California. He thinks it’s the sun sometimes. Gerard always thought that Mikey looked so frail and delicate under the Jersey wind, that he needed somewhere warm and safe. He remembers bringing him to the desert when he started dreaming up Danger Days. 

He had pitched his idea to Mikey and sort of lost his footing as he watched Mikey stand under the unwavering desert sun and close his eyes, smiling softly at the heat wrapping itself around him. Gerard knew it was the right move when he saw Mikey’s smile stretch into a tooth showing grin. 

“Gee? Babe, come on it’s almost three in the morning,” Frank says just as Gerard starts opening the photos to see the dates and try to make connections, to try and piece together this new puzzle that could have been his life. 

Gerard looks up from the screen and smiles bashfully. “Sorry.”

“What are you even looking--” Frank cuts off and stares at the screen, and for a brief moment, Gerard thinks there’s _hurt_ slicing through Frank’s gentle eyes. But then it’s over as quickly as it came and Frank shuts the laptop, "Come on, let's go to bed."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys, I didn't plan for Snippy the Turtle. That was just coincidence!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I just think we did a disservice to those kids,” Gerard whispers, pulling at his hair, “I think we let them all down.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lots of internal things in this chapter and talks about Danger Days. I have a whole rant about that album that I'll leave in the end notes so you can ignore if you want <3
> 
> Thanks for all the continuous support for this fic! The comments on the last chapter were so great...you all think I've killed off Mikey which either a) proves that you've read my previous work and know that I like angst and particularly angst directed at poor Mikey or b) are really reading into the hints that I'm dropping. 
> 
> WITHOUT SPOILING ANYTHING, please know that things in this timeline are really wonky and not at all how they appear. Some truth to that will be revealed in the next chapter ;)
> 
> (AKA I'm not saying you all are wrong, but you might not be right either...)

It takes a moment to remember where he is when Gerard wakes up in a strange bed. But it’s not a strange bed, not in this world. And Frank snoring softly next to him is supposed to be normal. It shouldn’t make Gerard’s heart thunder like it’s doing now. 

He turns on his side and takes him in. Let’s his eyes dance down Frank’s soft face, lax instead of twisted into the constant childish grin that seems to always pull at Frank’s lips. He’s always been so full of energy, most of the time fun and wondrous energy that always took Gerard’s breath away. But he’s been on the other side too, seen the anger that colors his cheeks red and makes the vein in his forehead pop out. But he doesn’t get a lot of moments like this, where Frank is just simply existing. 

He reaches out and brushes his hair out of his face, letting his fingers trail down and trace softly over his collarbone. He grins when he remembers how sensitive Frank is there, remembers the way he used to wither when Gerard would suck at the skin there. They were always pushing each other, especially that summer when everything started to fall apart. He remembers how Frank got more reckless with leaving marks high up on Gerard’s neck just out of spite. Gerard had hated covering them up with makeup, hated that he was trying to erase the proof that Frank had been there. That he was part of Gerard’s life and heart. 

Gerard knows that he’s not going to be able to get back to sleep even though he was up late last night. Even after Frank had brought him back to bed, Gerard laid awake with his head spinning. How much could have really changed from Gerard choosing to be with Frank? 

He gets out of bed quietly and makes his way down to the kitchen. Their fridge is a nightmare. It’s filled with fake everything. Fake cheese. Fake meat. Fake...whatever tofu was supposed to be considered. And there’s more vegetables than what Gerard has probably eaten in his whole life. He wrinkles his nose and goes in search of coffee instead. He’s relieved when he finds a french press and some coffee that smells pretty decent. He sets a kettle on the stove to boil then goes through the drawers in the kitchen. 

They have a lot more kitchen tools than Gerard would have thought, but then he remembers how much Frank has to cook for himself since his stomach is so sensitive. He finds a junk drawer that mostly has takeout menus and random screws or rubber bands. There’s a ticket stub from a movie theater where they saw _Star Wars: The Force Awakens_. Gerard grins, but it falls when he finds a folded piece of paper with New Jersey Center of Advanced Psychiatric and Behavioral Health labeled across the top. He opens it and scans it, picking up words like “Gerard Iero-Way” and “PTSD” and “Panic Attacks”. It looks like the first page of a treatment plan, Gerard can tell there’s pages missing from the hole in the corner that used to hold a staple. He wonders where the other papers are and if they’ll tell him what’s wrong with him in this timeline. What happened to make him break? For everyone to act like it was a miracle that he left the house last night? 

The kettle whistles, making Gerard jump and shove the paper back into the drawer. His hands are shaking as he fixes the french press, he’s barely able to find the strength to push the filter down. 

Gerard’s seen low points of his mental health before. He knows what it’s like to sit at rock bottom and pretend he’s fine. He’s known the addiction and the want to die to escape it all. But he hasn’t done this before, he doesn’t ever remember anyone even mentioning taking him to a hospital. Well...Mikey had suggested it when he was detoxing on the plane, holding Gerard’s shaking hands and whispering, “I’m going to get you some help.”

But once they landed, Gerard had squared his shoulders and said he didn’t need any help. That all he needed was his band to get him through this. And he had been right at the time, at least for a little while. Some nights he had wondered if this was bigger than him, if he couldn’t scream at his demons on stage anymore. 

Maybe that’s the difference. This Gerard didn’t have the band to fall back on. He couldn’t just write away his rambling thoughts into songs and couldn’t drown them under Frank and Ray’s guitars, couldn't muffle them with Mikey’s heavy bass. 

“Hey,” Frank says softly, like he knew he was interrupting Gerard’s thoughts. He places his hand on the small of Gerard’s back and presses a soft kiss to his shoulder. “You’re up pretty early.”

“Can’t sleep,” Gerard says truthfully, watching the water in the french press grow darker. 

Frank snorts, “Yeah, I’m sure coffee’s going to help.”

Gerard blushes and turns so he can face Frank. And he just can’t see the brokenness in him that’s obviously in Gerard. He doesn’t see any sort of battle that he’s been fighting, doesn’t see bruising dragging under his eyes or tightness around his lips. He doesn’t look plagued with caring for an unwell spouse. 

And he wishes that he could just _ask_ him what the hell is going on. It’s almost on his tongue, the need to just give in and tell him everything that’s happened to him. But, that’s sort of cheating and Gerard isn’t sure that Frank wouldn’t just drag him back to the nut house he was already admitted to once. 

He really needs Mikey to call him back. 

Frank kisses Gerard’s forehead then goes poking through the fridge. Gerard watches him warily, but sighs when he sees him pulling out fruit. Fruit he can totally do. 

Frank gets out a pot and fills it with water before setting it on the stove and turning the burner on. “Kinda feeling oats this morning,” Frank says and he smiles as he sees Gerard’s relieved expression, “Oh come on, you don’t hate the vegan food as much as you act like you do.”

Gerard just shrugs and goes to fill two cups of coffee. He makes Frank’s the way he used to have it on tour and startles a bit when Frank laughs. “You haven’t made me coffee like that in years. Babe, I stopped having coffee with my sugar years ago.”

Gerard pauses as he holds the fourth spoonful of sugar over Frank’s cup and he blushes. “Oh, sorry.”

Frank tilts his head at him. “You’ve been acting a little strange ever since yesterday morning. Wanna talk about it?”

Gerard needs _something_ , so he says, “I’ve just been thinking about the past lately.”

Frank takes the spoon from Gerard and stirs it in his coffee before taking a sip and smiling. “There’s nothing wrong with that,” he says around the mug, “I like to spend some time in my memories too.”

“Yeah?” Gerard asks softly, pouring oat milk into his own coffee. 

“Sure. Who doesn’t? I wouldn’t mind being twenty again,” he chuckles. 

Gerard grins, but he can tell that it doesn’t look genuine. Because it’s not. And Frank sets down the mug and comes to stand behind Gerard again. He puts his arms around his waist and lays his head in between his shoulder blades. “That’s not what you mean, is it?”

“I was just thinking about the band,” Gerard murmurs, stirring his coffee and watching the little whirlpool it creates.

“What about it?” Frank asks carefully, and it sounds like they may have had this conversation before. How could they not have?

Gerard thinks of the haunted look on Mikey’s face as they walked off Madison Square Garden and remembers the way his face lit up under the desert sun. “Do you think we ended it too soon?”

Frank tightens his hold. “We all agreed it was time. My Chemical Romance stopped being about the important stuff as soon as we walked off that stage.”

Gerard frowns. “What do you mean?”

Frank pulls away from Gerard and drops into a chair at the kitchen table. “I mean that I didn’t want to just be a game piece for the corporate assholes to move around. None of us did, _you’re_ the one who pushed the idea. You said that if we did anything after Black Parade, it would be disingenuous and that we’d just be sellouts.”

Gerard remembers all of this. He remembers the beginnings of Conventional Weapons and how fucking hard it was to go into the studio everyday and record songs he didn’t give a shit about. He remembers how hard it was to try and strip himself down so that he could just do the opposite of what everyone wanted. Like some rebellious teenager in him had reawoken under all the harsh lights of the stages they were ushered on. 

He never regretted the band and all the opportunities that came with it, but he hated how quickly the band started to slip from his fingers. It was _his_ salvation that he created for him and Mikey. And then it became a safe haven for the rest of the guys and the kids that needed them. That’s what My Chem was supposed to be about. It stopped being his band as soon as they started selling stadium tours and merch that looked like they were mass produced. He missed the small bars, missed the kids who screen printed their shirts and would still smell like ink when he put them on. He missed being able to look into each of their eyes and see that the lyrics he was screaming were penetrating their hearts. 

“What if we had taken it back somehow?” Gerard whispers, thinking about all the art and mayhem that they created with Danger Days. It was a “failure” of a record in regards to money and ticket sales, but after the sting of being called a let down by the label, Gerard felt immensely proud of that album. And even if every show broke Gerard down, even if the lyrics tore at his flesh and made him bleed over the synths and fluttery riffs, Gerard would do it again to see Mikey smile. To see Mikey bleach out the black and bleakness of The Black Parade from his appearance and walk on stage with glitter and color. 

“Taken what back?” Frank asks. 

“All of it,” Gerard says, leaning back against the counter, “Our music, our _message_. Just that we didn’t have to bend to what the music wanted us to be because we were never that, and the kids fucking knew that. We always told them to do what was authentic to them and not try to morph into what society wanted to build them into. And then, what? As soon as we were forced to make that choice, we gave up?”

Frank quirks an eyebrow. “Where is all this coming from?”

“I just think we did a disservice to those kids,” Gerard whispers, pulling at his hair, “I think we let them all down.”

Frank gets up and cups Gerard’s cheeks in his hands. “I care about you,” he says sternly, staring into his eyes, “You’re not a fucking martyr for the misunderstood, ok? We tried that, you tried to be bigger than what you should be and it nearly destroyed you. Or did you forget that I was in the Paramour with you while you went mad.”

“I didn’t--”

“Yeah,” Frank says, dropping his hands and walking away, “Yeah, you did. You fucking....look, I told you when we left there that I would never be a part of that again and I meant it. I’m not going to sit back and watch you tear out your insides again.”

Gerard feels his hands shake again and he closes his eyes as the images of the Paramour threaten to sink into his mind. He had spent so much time tucking away all those memories into steel cabinets, locking them tightly so that they would never leak back out. Because he couldn’t see the images of Joan of Arc burning behind his lids again, couldn’t look at the newspaper clippings that he had pasted to his bedroom wall, couldn’t see Mikey fall deeper and deeper into the ghosts. He couldn’t listen to Ray snapping at everyone, cracking under the pressure that Gerard had put on all of them. Couldn’t watch Bob’s eyes grow more sunken every day he wasn’t sleeping. And he...sometimes he doesn’t even remember that Frank was there. It was like he had blocked him out because he didn’t think that someone as beautiful as Frank deserved to be in a place as ugly as that. He didn’t think that Frank should ever be broken like the rest of them had been. 

And then Gerard had to snap his eyes open as the memory of Mikey being walked out of the Paramour started dancing in his mind like a sadistic jester. 

Gerard stares at the Frank that’s in front of him and he wonders why this Frank is so hellbent on turning his back on the band when the Frank from his time had ignored his calls and texts after Gerard submitted the post that would end the band in 2013. He wonders if this Frank had simply lost the drive. Or worse, he wonders if this Frank had lost his faith in Gerard. If getting too close to Gerard had shattered the illusion that Gerard could take on something bigger than himself, that he could transcend and save all those kids that came out to their shows with broken hearts, dreams and bodies. If Frank had finally seen the cracks in Gerard’s armor and knew that he would crumble down at any moment. That Frank saw that he was just a man, trying to carry too much on his shoulders. 

“What about the rest of them?” Gerard whispers, “What about Mikey and Ray?”

Frank looks at the floor, probably to hide his expression, but Gerard can tell that Frank looks like he’s going to throw up. “Ray is happy with his kids and his side projects.”

“And Mikey?” Gerard whispers softly, “Don’t tell me you didn’t see how he looked after the MSG show.”

Frank covers his face. “Why are you talking about this?” He whispers, “You always try to bring in everyone’s sadness as your own. You’re not supposed to fix everyone, Gerard.”

“Mikey isn’t everyone.”

Frank looks up at him, his eyes hard but empty, like he’s trying to not feel anything as he says, “I know.”

*

Gerard spends the rest of the morning sitting at the kitchen table with his sketchbook in front of Frank. He draws the killjoys hastily and waves his arms around a lot as he tells Frank about all the color and the desert and the Trans Am. Frank smiles at that, and Gerard takes it as a win. 

“Wait, what’s with the names?” Frank says with a grin, “Party Poison? Kinda of a callback, huh?”

Gerard blushes, he never thought about it like that when he had worked on this the first time. Back when Lyn-z had taken Gerard to the desert to get out of the studio and find a new perspective. “You’re an artist,” She had said, “So be an artist.”

And so Gerard had spent weeks hidden in his studio as he cranked out drawings of this world that he could dive into. Where he rebelled in bright colors to fight against the corporation that wanted to water him down into a clean cut thirty something year old that would sell magazines. He had written out different names for his own character, he’d let the others pick their own, but he needed something he could tie himself to. Something he could hide behind. 

“I never thought of it that way,” He whispers, because yeah, there was some sort of tether to his old self hidden in that name. Or another instance where he couldn’t escape the “chemical brother” label that he had earned. 

“Fun Ghoul,” Frank laughs, tapping at his killjoy. He traces the icon of the demented smiley face, “I like it,” he says, then laughs a little at Ray’s character because it looks like something that he’d have fun with. And he did, Gerard can’t remember ever seeing Ray just let go and not get so bogged down to the technical details of each song. He had a blast just running through the desert with a plastic ray gun and not having to take the band as seriously as they had in the past. 

“And this one’s Mikey’s,” he says, pointing at Kobra Kid. He doesn’t tell him that they came up with the character together, because Mikey and Gerard probably never had that conversation in this timeline. But Mikey had a huge hand in Danger Days, right in the beginning. Gerard remembers sitting in the bathroom bleaching his hair for him and it felt like they were teenagers again in their mom’s bathroom with cheap boxed bleach from the drugstore. 

“I’m sure he would have loved it,” Frank says softly and Gerard frowns at the past tense. 

“What do you mean?”

Frank gives him a slow look, like he’s talking to a scared animal. “Baby, we can’t do this. It’s a great idea, it’s beautiful and I love this world you made, but the band broke up.”

Gerard nods and closes the sketchbook, “Right, yeah, you’re right.”

When he gets up from the table, Frank sighs, “Gee…” but he doesn’t make any effort to follow Gerard down to the studio. 

Gerard sets the sketchbook down on his desk and sits down, pulling out his phone and sighing when there’s still no call from Mikey. He pulls up his text messages and shakes his head because _why didn’t he think of this before_? Only, the last message between him and Mikey is almost a year ago and it doesn’t look very pretty. 

_I don’t even know you anymore._

Was the last thing that Gerard had sent to him. And it had been read, but Mikey didn’t respond. 

Oh. 

Maybe that’s why Frank doesn’t bring up Mikey and why Mikey won’t return his call. Because apparently in this world, Mikey and Gerard aren’t on good terms. And that almost hurts as much as his daughter not existing, because Mikey is his flesh and blood too. Only, Mikey’s mind is Gerard’s too. And his heart. And every secret because they never kept anything from each other. Everything that Gerard did was for Mikey. The band. The albums. Moving to LA. Taking him to the desert. 

Gerard doesn’t even realize he’s crying until there’s tears sprinkling onto his screen. How could Gerard wanting to be happy and in love bring so much pain? How could someone as beautiful like Frank loving someone as broken as Gerard be so detrimental to the people he loves? And it’s not like he expected Bandit to somehow exist in this world when he was never with Lyn-z, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want both. But, Mikey? That’s just cruel, because he should be here. He should be right here next to Gerard talking to him about how crazy this whole experience is. He should be sitting next to him telling him what an idiot he is for crying in the studio when he has Frank upstairs in the kitchen that they apparently shared. 

Gerard wipes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Because it doesn’t really matter, Gerard isn’t staying here anyway. He’s going to go back to his own time where he has his daughter and where his brother doesn’t hate him. 

He doesn’t belong here.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Danger Days Rant:
> 
> Ok, so I love this album so much but I have such a hard time feeling ok about that love because it's so complex. Obviously it's such a great album as for as the music itself. Argue what you want about it not sounding like other MCR albums or whatever. My thing is the context in which this album was written (if you've read December 3rd you know what I'm getting at). I think that all the color and the art was just a way to distract everyone from the brokenness that was going on in the band, so it's so hard to love something when I know that they were hurting so much, especially what we know about Gerard now. 
> 
> Anyway, how this relates to the fic. It just circles back to Gerard being a martyr again. He knows the hell he goes through in Danger Days because he's lived it in another timeline, but he still is suggesting it to Frank because he's willing to sacrifice his own well being for his brother. Even if it's not physically possible to do that album in this timeline, the fact that Gerard is still offering it up to Frank if he needs the band again is very telling of Gerard's character and his need to still rip himself to pieces for everyone else.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Frank hugs Gerard and sways them gently, comforting even though he doesn’t know why it’s needed. Frank feels like home, a home that Gerard doesn’t feel like he has to pretend to belong. A home that he doesn’t have to find his own place in. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thank you so much for all the love and support on the last chapter. Reading your predictions and reactions is SO much fun!

“Hey,” Frank says softly when Gerard emerges from the studio. 

He had spent the majority of the day sulking in the basement, looking through his texts with Mikey. He knows that he shouldn’t get that worked up about it since he’s going to be going back to his own timeline, but something is pulling in his gut that what’s going on with Mikey is more than what he’s seeing. 

Frank’s kneading dough on the kitchen counter and he smiles, holding out his arm for Gerard to come over. Gerard hesitates only for a half a second before stepping into Frank’s arms. He sprinkles flour on Gerard’s hands then puts his own hands over his and they knead the dough together. Gerard’s always been a sensations sort of guy, whenever the anxiety got too much for him, he needed something to do with his hands to quiet his mind. 

And somehow Frank knew that. Well, maybe not _somehow_. Standing at the kitchen counter with Frank pressed up against his back and the dough squishing under their entwined fingers makes him think of times on tour or recording that Frank came to his rescue, times that he took for granted. 

Like the time he went back to Japan the first time after his incident. He couldn’t sit still, kept going in and out of his hotel room and just roaming the halls even though it was ass crack in the morning. And he knew that the other guys were on edge a little bit because of it, Bob had snapped at him for opening and closing his door so much. Finally, Frank had come to his hotel room with a box of cornstarch. 

Gerard frowned and tilted his head. He used to use cornstarch as a makeshift foundation sometimes to get his face deathly pale during that phase when he thought it was cool to look like a vampire. Frank had just pushed past him and walked into the bathroom and turned on the sink. Gerard followed him in since he kept the door open and watched him mix water and cornstarch together in the sink. 

“What are you--” but Gerard had been cut off by Frank pressing his hands into the mixture. 

It was really odd because it felt like a liquid, but when he balled his fist around the mixture it almost solidified only to turn back into a liquid. “What the hell is this?”

“My science teacher used to call it Ooblek,” Frank said, sitting back on the edge of the tub to watch Gerard play in the sink. 

And he hadn’t made Gerard talk about it or asked him any hard questions. He just played random songs or stand up comedy sketches off his phone and let Gerard work out his anxiety in the sink. 

But Frank’s not silent this time. “Do you want to talk about it?”

And Gerard knows he needs to give something up, he has to explain _something_ so that this Frank doesn’t get worried. He deserves better than that. He leans back against his chest and says, “Do you ever just wake up one day and sort of have a new perspective?”

Frank leads Gerard’s hands into shaping the dough so that it can rise. They stick it in a bowl and Gerard watches him throw a tea towel over it while considering his answer. “What do you mean?” He murmurs, sitting down at the kitchen table. 

Gerard can’t talk to him about this without fidgeting, so he starts making tea. Lyn-z got him to switch to tea in the middle of the day, but he always ended back on the coffee by the end of the night. He sets the kettle on the stove and starts fiddling with the different boxes of tea that they own. 

“I don’t know,” he whispers, trying to gauge what he can tell him, “Just that I didn’t appreciate you.”

He doesn’t have to turn to feel Frank’s heartbroken expression. “Gee,” he breathes, and then Gerard sighs when he feels Frank’s arms circling his waist. “What’s going on, baby?”

And Gerard feels his eyes grow hot from the threat of tears, because he doesn’t know how to explain to him that Frank could have died. He could have died on the other side of the world and Gerard was pretty sure the last thing he said to him was “see you later” after someone’s, maybe Ray’s, birthday party in that sort of casualness that Gerard would cringe at now. Because he’s pretty sure he wasn’t even looking at Frank when he said it. 

Because he had been a coward. He had always been a coward when it came to Frank. Frank, who was a force to be reckoned with, who moved through the world like he was the sun and everything else revolved around him, feeding off his light and energy. But sometimes he was too bright and the light had always scared Gerard. He hated being under the spotlight when it wasn’t of his own choosing. When the light shone on him as Gerard and not a character on stage, showing all his insecurities and ugliness that he tried to stuff deep down into his dripping black tar heart. 

“I’ve been thinking about what would have happened if things had ended up differently after ProRev,” Gerard murmurs, stuffing a strainer full of loose leaf tea.

“What do you mean?” Frank murmurs against his neck, his hand moving to trace soft circles against his hip.

“What if we never ended up together?” Gerard asks in a tiny voice, because he knows what it’s like. How the weeks after his and Lyn-z’s wedding had been hell. He tried to keep himself distracted with her, barely spoke to the guys except at soundcheck and Frank hadn’t even looked at him. Frank had just shown up and stood where he was supposed to on stage, barely moving from his area the whole show. Gerard couldn’t lose himself in the music, because it wasn’t the same without Frank. Being on stage wasn’t the same without him pressed against Frank, mouthing at his salty, dripping skin. Wasn’t the same to hear the pain in Frank’s voice when he screamed into the mic, “Lie to me!”

Frank snorts, startling Gerard out of his spiraling thoughts. “Not possible,” he says, turning Gerard to look at him. Gerard stares at Frank’s shoes instead, unable to meet his eyes. They look too similar to the ones he had said goodbye to at the door, the ones glassy with tears from the years of heartbreak Gerard had inflicted on the both of them. 

Frank hooks his finger under Gerard’s chin and lifts his face towards him. “It’s always been you and me,” he whispers, leaning in to rest his forehead against Gerard’s, “Ever since I first met you I knew. There’s just this...tug, or whatever. And I don’t know where it came from or why it’s there, but ever since I saw you standing outside that divey bar you had no business being in, I fucking knew it was you.”

Gerard reaches up and strokes his cheeks. “But it took us so long,” he whispers, and _longer_ in his time. Not even together in his time, just this slow dancing around each other in a constant missed opportunity. 

Frank shakes his head against Gerard’s. “Doesn’t matter. I don’t care how many years it took us, I don’t care if there’s some dimension out there where you’re not my husband, I will always be yours. The universe knows that,” he whispers, lifting his head up to stare in Gerard’s eyes like he’s trying to drill the truth into Gerard’s stubborn mind, “it knows better than to keep us apart.”

*

“No, the other one,” Gerard murmurs, pointing to the dark button down that Frank was about to hang back up. 

Frank rolls his eyes, but he’s got a soft smile on his face. 

The heaviness of this morning and afternoon dissipated into a haze of domesticity that Gerard hadn’t realized he had missed. Lyn-z and him used to laze around the house and watch trashy TV while working on separate projects. She would be cutting paper and arranging it on a canvas while Gerard worked on sketches or wrote for Umbrella Academy. And they’d order Thai or something messy to slurp up on the couch. Those were always the moments he missed when he thought about his divorce. 

Frank hadn’t found the need for personal space in this universe either it seemed, he leaned on Gerard all afternoon on the couch and would push Gerard’s sketchbook out of his hands to lay his head in his lap and Gerard couldn’t find the will to be frustrated about it. 

“Remind me why I’m letting you drag me to some art exhibit that will have nothing I can eat?” Frank mutters, looking through his jackets to find something to pair with his shirt. 

Gerard smirks and goes into the bathroom to change. “Because you love me?” He calls out, stepping out of his clothes. He was pleasantly surprised when his phone had dinged to remind him of an art gallery opening tonight, and Gerard was about to ignore it when his interest was piqued. What kind of art galleries did Gerard get invited to in this universe and what art circles did he run in? 

Frank walks in just as Gerard slides his olive green shirt over his head. In all the mess of his closet, it was something that closely resembled his comfort zone. Frank leans against the doorway and quirks an eyebrow at him. “So…” he starts, crossing his arms. 

Gerard feels his stomach drop and busies himself with putting product in his hair to achieve the perfect set of disarray strands. “So?” He asks, trying to keep his voice neutral. 

“What’s with you not changing in front of me anymore?” He asks in a way that’s laced with concern, but masked under a heavy layer of forced indifference. 

Gerard looks through his side of the bathroom cabinets and finds some eyeliner, he briefly wonders if that’s something he still does here. He forgoes it and finds some brown shadow that he thinks about dabbing on his eyelids instead. 

“Gee,” Frank sighs, in that voice that is totally calling him out on his shit. It’s the kind of voice that says _I see right through you_ because he knows all of Gerard’s tricks, even the ones that trick himself. 

“Just haven’t been feeling that confident with how I look,” he mutters, closing the cabinet and rubbing shadow against his lids. 

Frank frowns at him through the mirror and stalks over to him. Gerard sighs and hangs his head, looking down at the sink.

“You’re beautiful, Gerard,” Frank says, nuzzling against the back of his neck. Gerard’s bronzed eyelids flutter shut and he leans back against Frank’s chest as Frank’s hands start to wonder. He slides them up Gerard’s shirt and strokes his sternum. “I can’t hardly keep my hands off of you,” he whispers against his ear, licking the curve of it. And _fuck_ , Gerard’s knees almost buckled, but Frank is faster and turns him before lifting him up on the vanity. 

Gerard pulls at Frank’s collar and drags his lips to his. Gerard remembers the first time he kissed Frank. It was rushed and messy, fueled by too much carbonated alcohol and young carelessness. They had been at an afterparty of some eyeball show and were pressed into someone’s bedroom. Gerard can’t even remember getting into the room. He only remembers that one minute he was standing in the kitchen by the keg and then the next he was being pressed against an old NSYNC poster and Frank’s lip ring was digging into his. 

When Frank’s hands had drifted to Gerard’s pants, Gerard had stiffened and Frank took a step back. Just far enough for Gerard to breathe his own air and catch up to what they were doing. “I’m sorry,” Gerard had whispered, shaking his head, “I’m not...just, not yet?” 

And Frank had just smiled softly, and nodded before walking back to him and kissing him sweetly like he had done nothing wrong. Because he hadn’t in Frank’s eyes. If Gerard had been in that room with anyone else, he’s sure he would have been met with rolled eyes or a slammed door. But Frank had cupped his cheeks and kissed him like he was worth the wait. 

Gerard doesn’t want to wait now. He hastily unbuttons Frank’s shirt, popping one button off along the way. “Hey,” Frank mutters when they heard it hit the tiled floor. 

“I’ll buy you a new one,” Gerard whispers, pushing the unbuttoned fabric off him and kissing his collarbone. Frank doesn’t argue or seems even mildly affronted by the damaged shit, just lifts Gerard like he weighs next to nothing and carries him the short distance to their bed. 

He sets him down with tenderness, the rush in the bathroom dissolving into something molten and slow as Frank peels off Gerard’s shirt and presses hot, open mouthed kisses to his bare skin. Gerard tries to remember why he felt embarrassed about his body under Frank’s hands and lips, raining praise and caresses like he was the art that they were seeing tonight. Like he was something priceless and worth the extra care. 

Frank looks up at him through his lashes as he slips down the bed and unbuttons Gerard’s dark denim, pulling them down in Frank’s descent. He keeps kissing and touching Gerard the whole time he’s undressing him, keeping him withering until the fabric seems too heavy and he sighs in relief when Frank rids them of their clothing and Gerard feels the press of flesh against flesh. 

He doesn’t remember it ever being like this with him. It was always quick and rough in the shadow of their fear, or Gerard’s fear. And not necessarily that Gerard was ashamed of Frank. Just that if they got caught, it would make it real and something that Gerard would have to evaluate. Something he would have to realize wasn’t going away and didn’t only exist when Gerard craved the taste of Frank after a show. It would make Gerard have to admit things that he hadn’t been ready for in a long time. 

It feels like the first time Gerard’s ever made love with Frank. And he wished that Frank could be experiencing it like this with him, that they could somehow share this newness. Frank had always moved like he was rushing through to get to the next thing, but he slowed down to a deliberateness that almost made Gerard cry. Because it was like Frank was pausing the world so that they could take their time touching, tasting, whispering praises and declarations. 

When Frank kisses down Gerard’s navel, nuzzles against the pubic hair, before licking up the length of him, all the air leaves Gerard. And when he takes Gerard into his mouth, sucking at the head before sinking further down, Gerard lets out a breathy whimper and pushes his head back into the mattress like he could sink into it and take Frank with him, like they could just be dissolved into this heat that’s coursing through Gerard’s blood. 

Gerard’s never been great at lasting long when blowjobs are involved, it was partly because he was such a visual person. It just takes one look at Frank’s lips, red and stretched around Gerard looking up at him through his damp lashes to make him whimper, “Frankie,” in warning. 

Frank doesn’t let up and Gerard grips the sheets, feeling himself coil tighter and tighter and prepares to snap apart when Frank pulls off entirely. He cries out and bucks his hips, only to be met with a soft chuckle, “I know, baby,” and a warm hand settling his hips. 

Frank strokes his hips and kisses the inside of his thighs, waiting for Gerard to settle back down before taking him back in his mouth. Gerard releases the sheets and tangles his fingers in Frank’s hair instead, intent on keeping him in place this time. Frank chuckles around him, the vibrations making Gerard groan low and broken. 

He’s sure he’s lost in whatever place Frank’s dragged him to with his mouth. All he knows is that he’s been on the verge of an orgasm multiple times only to have a sadistic Frank pull away and kiss at his thighs or belly until Gerard begs and _begs._ This time when Frank’s mouth returns, so does a slick finger pressed against Gerard’s entrance. Gerard nods and whimpers, “please, please, please.”

It only takes a few passes against Gerard’s prostate before his vision goes black and he can’t hear anything but sound ripping out of his throat and the thunderous pounding of his heart. Frank’s there to catch him when he comes plummeting down, kissing along his jaw and whispers, “You’re so beautiful, baby,” and , “So good, you’re so good,” and , “God, I fucking love you.” 

Gerard answers him with a kiss, shaky, but demanding. He spreads his legs around Frank and feels him still hard against him. “Frank,” he whispers, and he’s glad that Frank knows exactly what he’s asking for without him needing to specify. 

When Frank presses in, it’s like Gerard’s realizing that he’s been missing part of his heart for a decade without knowing what was wrong this whole time. Because it’s not just fucking with Frank. For the first time in years, he’s remembering why they call it making love, because that’s what it feels like. Like Frank is creating something with Gerard, not just using and giving. It’s something they're building together, a crescendo that they’re both building between their breathes and gasps and rhythmic hearts. In the entanglement of their hands and the twists of their legs, the grinding of their hips and the arches of backs. The desperation to get _closer, closer_ until Frank’s thrusts are growing more erratic and he’s babbling against Gerard’s clavicle. 

And Gerard knows he’s not twenty anymore, but he feels himself tipping over the edge already. The friction of Frank against his cock and the stretch of him inside him, hitting his prostate each time he sinks into him. “Come on, come on,” he breathes, and Gerard knows by now that his body listens to no one but Frank’s. That he’d bend and twist to Frank’s every whim, but all he asks is for Gerard to let go. 

So he does. 

*

“I think there’s cum in my hair,” Frank sighs when they pull up to the gallery and he runs his fingers through his hair. 

Gerard chuckles and tugs at his chin, “let me see.”

Frank leans towards him and Gerard turns on the dome light in the car, inspecting his dark strands. “I think you’re fine,” he says, “I think it’s just build up wax that you put in your hair. I thought you were from Jersey, only surfers from Venice Beach or hipsters use wax.”

“The fuck did you just call me?” Frank bites, but he’s as intimidating as a shih tzu.

Gerard gives him a kiss to soften the blow and gets out of the car. He reaches for Frank’s hand like it’s becoming second nature and they head towards the doors. He doesn’t recognize anyone just yet, but he’s not too sure they’re late enough for his usual crowd to show. Frank hangs back and lets Gerard look through the paintings that are cascading along the walls, giving him space to slip into the colors and hues of the acrylics. 

It’s not until much later that he emerges on the other side of the gallery that he hears that familiar laugh. That girlish giggle with the aftertaste of a woman that’s seen too much of the world to hold onto the impression of innocence. 

Gerard’s head whips around and he sees her, just over Frank’s shoulder down by the bar. She throws her head back, dark hair waving over her dark clothed shoulders, laughing through her cherry red lips. He could spot her, hear her, _feel_ her in any room, any size for the rest of his life. Because while Frank may be the love of his life, he’s lived years with Lyn-z in his heart. Even if in this universe she’s not his and hasn’t been for years, his heart swells with that familiarity that he doesn’t think he’ll never want to chase away. 

Frank turns and stiffens, before turning back to him with a carefully apathetic expression. “We should go say hi,” he says. 

Gerard nods, and reaches out for Frank’s hand, which seems like it was the right move because Frank’s face slips back into that natural Frank glow. As if the universe is cruel, or just more in tune than Gerard has given it credit for, Lyn-z turns before they reach her and she breaks into an earth shattering smile. She holds out her arms and closes the distance, pulling Gerard into a hug he hasn’t had since his divorce. 

She smells the same. That sweetness that clings to her skin but chases it with a hit of spice that Gerard always chuckles at. She feels like home and like a stranger all at once, and he wants to melt into her at the same time as he wants to run away and hide. “Hey,” he whispers against her jeweled ear. 

She squeezes him. “Hey,” she whispers back, like she remembers their game from that summer in 2007. 

He holds her for a beat then steps back, he thinks it’s important that he’s the one to end the hug. She stares at him for a moment, and it’s almost like she can see that he doesn’t belong here. She’s always been intuitive, always held some understanding higher than this world. But she just gives him a knowing smile and says, “My other half should be around here somewhere,” she says, slipping back into the casualness of friendly chatter. She glances around the room and shrugs, “I can never keep track of him.”

Him. 

Of course. And he shouldn’t feel jealous, not when he has Frank standing behind him and pressing a hand comfortably on his hip. Of course she would have married someone else, she’s too special to not be wanted by someone. Someone else joins their group, someone that knows Gerard from another life that he knows he should probably remember. It would have been someone around ProRev and the way their hair is dyed, he knows that he probably would have liked them if he made enough room in his mind to catalog all people he’s come in contact with over the years. 

When Frank excuses himself to the bar and another person Gerard doesn’t know comes to talk to Lyn-z, Gerard slips away and makes his way back through the art pieces, pausing at the ones he had made a note to return to. 

There’s a little girl standing in front of a sculpture that he had missed during his first go around. She’s standing with dark pigtails and a bright purple dress, holding onto a juice box that he’s sure the gallery owners would be horrified over if they saw how close she was standing to the art with her dangerous purple liquid. 

She glances up at him once he gets closer and his heart drops out of his chest. 

_Bandit_. 

He knows, some logical part of him knows that this isn’t his daughter. That it’s not possible given biology and just the fucking rules of the world, but that’s her. He’s never been more sure of anything in his life that the little girl staring up at him with a knowing smile, mirroring her mother’s, is his daughter. 

“Bandit?” He whispers, sinking down so that he’s eye level with her. 

She shrugs, but doesn’t lose her smile. 

“Do you know who I am?” he breathes.

She giggles and holds up a finger to her lips, “Shh.”

Gerard cocks his head to the side. “Do you know what’s going on?”

She reaches out and takes his hand, and _fuck_ , he almost cries right there. Because he misses his daughter so much, and if he had the choice to redo the last six years of her life he would make sure that he was more involved. He’d make sure she never had to guess if her father loved her. 

“Hey, kiddo!” 

The little girl grins and turns before running to a man who’s squatting down to pick her up. She squeals in laughter as he lifts her and walks towards Lyn-z. She kisses Lyn-z’s cheek and then lays her head on the man’s shoulder. They look like a complete family. They look like they all belong together, something that Gerard hadn’t felt like he could make happen when it was him in that picture. He always felt out of place, like he was just pretending. Like he was just a stand in for the father that was supposed to be holding Bandit. 

“You look like you’re ready,” Frank murmurs, slipping an arm around him.

Gerard turns into him and presses his face against Frank’s shoulder. 

Because up until this point he had been rushing back to his own time as soon as this week was up so that he could return to Bandit. But she exists in this time, just not to him. And the way she’s smiling in her family eases the pain that’s settled into Gerard’s heart since he got to this world. She belongs here, just not with him. 

And he can live with that. Because he’s still her father and he wants the best for her. Even if that’s not him. 

Frank hugs Gerard and sways them gently, comforting even though he doesn’t know why it’s needed. Frank feels like home, a home that Gerard doesn’t feel like he has to pretend to belong. A home that he doesn’t have to find his own place in. 

A home where he feels like he belongs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A couple people guessed we'd see Lyn-z in this world, so kudos for your prediction ;) How many of you thought we'd see a version of Bandit?


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was VERY hard to write. Grab the tissues, but remember the tags for this fic. 
> 
> I gave you a pretty fluffy and smutty chapter last time...an angsty one was bound to follow ;)

Gerard calls Mikey again and sighs when he hears Mikey’s familiar voice tell him that he’s unable to take his call...again. He’s starting to get worried now, because even when they would fight, they always made sure to check in on each other. There was the one time in college when Gerard had accidentally let it slip that Mikey had been getting into clubs with his fake ID and his mom grounded him for a month. Mikey hadn’t talked to him for a week, but he made sure to text him something every three days, even if it was just a blank text.

It was a rule they had started back when Gerard had gotten wrapped up in a project for school and didn’t check his phone for days. After the third, Mikey showed up at his dorm near tears and then started slapping at him after he saw that Gerard was ok. “You idiot!” He cried, batting at Gerard’s hands, “I thought something had happened to you!”

And then it became a necessity when the band started and Mikey and Gerard started losing days at the bottom of a bottle. But no matter how fucked up they got, they always reached out to let the other one know that they were alright. There were sometimes, especially lately, when that was the only interaction he would get all week. Gerard would lose his days down in his studio and would only realize that days had passed when Mikey called, “Hey,” he’d always say, like he wasn’t worried. 

There had been a time when that was Gerard’s job though. Back when Mikey was going through his divorce and was sliding back into the dark depression that Gerard thought they left behind at the Paramour. 

Only Gerard didn’t call every three days, he showed up at his doorstep with food and would force Mikey to eat in front of him just so he could have the peace of mind. The worst was the day he showed up and Mikey didn’t answer the door. For a long anxiety ridden moment, Gerard thought he’d walk into the house to find his brother dead. He used to have nightmares about that when they were still in the band, back when they all had an alcohol problem and Mikey was experimenting with drugs. He always had nightmares that he’d wake up to find out that his brother had died overnight while Gerard was tucked away in his bunk, safe and sound. And the nightmares progressed when he was at the Paramour, and the deaths got more gruesome. 

But when he turned the key, he found Mikey crying on the bathroom floor, smelling like he had drank an entire bar. Gerard never said anything to others who drank in front of him, even after his relapse, but he remembers how angry he was at Mikey in that moment. So angry at him for looking how he had felt hunched over a trash can in Japan. 

“Easy, Mikes,” Gerard had whispered, rubbing his back as Mikey expelled liquor and whatever demons he was trying to fight into the toilet bowl, “I’ve got you.”

And Mikey had only whimpered, too far gone to be able to form full sentences. 

Gerard had stayed with him all night and called Lyn-Z to tell her that he was going to stay the week. 

“‘M fine,” Mikey had whispered at some point in the middle of the night, slumped against the bathroom wall. 

“Think you can get in the shower or should I run you a bath?” Gerard asked softly, wiping the sweat off Mikey’s forehead with a washcloth. 

“Bath,” Mikey mumbled, knowing he didn’t have a chance to argue. Not when he had done the same thing for Gerard all those years ago. 

Gerard had run the bath and filled it with all the girly shit that Mikey liked, smiling when he saw Mikey’s shoulders drop from their tense hold as the room filled with lavender. Gerard stayed with him, not trusting him to be alone and read him comic books that had come out that week. 

And then Gerard got him to sit on the couch and fed him dumplings from his favorite takeout place while they put on _The Twilight Zone_. Mikey ate through two containers of dumplings, which made Gerard’s heart sink when he realized how long it must have been since Mikey had consumed anything that wasn’t alcohol. 

“You need help,” Gerard whispered. 

Mikey stiffened and didn’t say anything for a long time, he waited until the episode was over to say, “I know.”

Gerard reached for his hand and squeezed his fingers. “I’ll help.”

Mikey didn’t hesitate that time when he said, “I know.”

So they never left each other alone for longer than three days. Enough time to give each other breathing room, but not long enough for anything bad to happen. At least, that was the theory. Gerard frowned, because it hadn’t been three days yet. He’d give Mikey until tomorrow before he raised Hell. 

And he wonders if they even still checked in on each other in this timeline. Surely whatever had happened between them wouldn’t have overturned their system. Gerard goes through the text messages again, reading further back this time to see what could have gone wrong, but Gerard doesn’t get anything through the short responses. He’s sure whatever falling out they had happened on the phone or in person, Gerard never liked to have conversations through text where tones and expressions were absent. 

“Come to the studio with me,” Frank murmurs, kissing his cheek and making him look up from his phone. 

They’re sitting in the kitchen and Gerard is nursing his second cup of coffee. “Yeah?” He asks, because he’d like to see what Frank’s been working on. He had always been curious to see Frank create music outside of My Chem and wanted to see if he was any different. He wanted to see Frank in charge of a creative project. 

Frank nods and kisses him, slow and promising. Gerard sighs and starts to drag him closer, trying to pull him into his lap. 

“No, no, I can’t,” Frank laughs breathlessly, “Babe, I have to--”

Gerard interrupts him with another kiss, but gets his hands pushed away as they make their way to Frank’s belt. 

“I really can’t, “ he giggles, “I’m running late already.”

“You were always late before,” Gerard protests, remembering all the times Frank strolled into studio times hungover and clutching coffee. There may have been a few fights over that.

“Oh whatever,” Frank says, rolling his eyes playfully. “You were such a diva back then.”

“A diva that was on time!”

Frank throws a piece of his donut at him. “Whatever. Get your cute ass moving.”

Gerard had expected Frank to be fiery in the studio like he is with everything else in his life, but he’s confident in a sure and steady sort of way. He talks in a calm cadence and takes the time to explain his ideas to the rest of the band and whoever is working on the album with him. And for a split second he can see Frank like that as a father. 

Which knocks Gerard off his axis for a moment, because he’s seen Frank as a father. He remembers the shakiness in Frank’s voice when he told him that Jamia was pregnant, and how it turned steady by the time Gerard got around to meeting the twins. He’s seen him FaceTime them on tour and has been to his house when he tells them to wash up for dinner. But the image Gerard sees isn’t with the kids he’s met in 2016, it’s with their kids. Imaginary kids that don’t exist. 

And he’d feel guilty about it, except now he knows that there’s some way in this world that all of their loved ones still exist and have a life. Maybe even a better life, especially from where he stood last night watching Bandit and Lyn-z. So, he lets himself wonder a bit. Let’s himself imagine what it would be like to watch Frank rock their infant in his arms after not sleeping for hours on end. How it would be to video record their infant taking their first steps to Frank’s outstretched arms. Or laugh and take bets on what their kid’s first word would be. Gerard imagines going through fatherhood and watching Frank experience it for the first time with him, to hold all those firsts like the rarest treasure in their hearts. 

And it starts to ache deep inside of Gerard, how badly he wants this for them. For the first time since he’s gotten here, he really wants to stay. He wants to create a family with Frank and he wants to be his fucking husband. The idea of going back to his cold life with rare visits from Bandit and phone calls from Mikey to keep him company feels like a cold hand gripping his heart and squeezing. Now that he knows what it’s like to wake up next to Frank and feel him roll into him and hold him as he starts to wake up for the morning, he can’t go back to waking up at his studio desk with an aching back and hollowed inside. He can’t go back knowing that he could have had all of this if he hadn’t been such a coward. This is his chance to live his best life, where he gets to be in love with his best friend and live out the happy ending they were always supposed to get. 

“You look like you’re miles away,” Frank whispers when they decide to break for the night. 

Gerard hadn’t even noticed that he had checked out for so long. He blushes and whispers, “I’m sorry,” because he remembers how much Lyn-z had hated that. 

Frank just shrugs and kisses his forehead. “I know how you get sometimes. It’s nothing bad, right?”

Gerard shakes his head. “No, just imagining things.”

Frank chuckles and takes his hand. “Let’s go home,” he whispers. 

Gerard nods and lets him bring him to the car. They’re almost to the house when Gerard can’t help it anymore and blurts out, “Why haven’t we had kids?”

Frank’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline. “Excuse me?” He chokes out. 

Gerard’s heart sinks. Oh. Maybe this Frank never wanted kids. Maybe he doesn’t want kids with someone like Gerard who apparently had to stay in a psychiatric hospital. “Oh,” Gerard whispers, and he wants to kick himself at how pathetic he sounds. 

Frank turns to look at him, a mix of anger and shock, before looking back at the road. He doesn’t say anything when they pull up to the house, he just gets out and slams the door. Gerard jumps a bit, wondering what the fuck happened to make Frank have such a bad reaction to Gerard asking about kids. They’ve been married for years, surely this isn’t out of the blue. 

Gerard gets out of the car and hesitantly follows him inside. Frank is chucking a glass of water like it’s a can of beer. 

“Look, I’m sorry--”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Frank growls, setting the cup on the counter. 

Gerard jumps again. “I--”

“I’ve been begging you for kids for _years_ ,” Frank bites out.

Oh.

“And you always feed me some bullshit about how you don’t want to bring a kid into this world or how you’re too broken to take care of someone right now,” Frank continues. 

“I--”

“And I get it, ok,” Frank interrupts again, “I know that being hospitalized really shook you up, but it’s been almost two years now, Gee, and you’ve been doing fine. You go to your therapy appointments, you take your meds, you do your little meditation sessions out in the garden”--his _what?_ \-- “and you haven’t had an attack in a long time.”

“Frank--”

“So don’t...I can’t believe you’d ask me like that. Like _I’m_ the one who’s been keeping us from having kids,” Frank finishes with a huff. 

Gerard pulls out a cigarette and sits at the counter, Frank narrows his eyes at him. “What?” Gerard asks. 

Frank snatches the cigarette and throws it in the trash. “You told me you quit. I _knew_ I smelled smoke on you the other day when you took Killer for a walk.”

Gerard sighs and leans back in his seat. He wishes the lady from the bench would have given him some memories or something when he woke up. He’d have avoided a lot of confusion and this fight if he knew what the fuck was going on half of the time. 

Frank sighs and leans against the counter, crossing his arms and fixing Gerard with a look that he’s all too familiar with. It’s the same one he saw when Gerard’s voice was all fucked up from doing coke all night with Bert. The same one he saw when Gerard had told him he was choosing Lyn-z. The same one he saw when Gerard had relapsed. 

Disappointment. 

“What’s going on with you?” Frank asks again, and Gerard is sick of trying to answer that question. 

He just shrugs and so Frank takes a deep breath and asks, “Is this about Mikey?”

Gerard freezes and takes in Frank’s careful expression, perfectly masked to not give anything away, but there’s pain in his eyes. They look haunted almost, like he’s seen something he’ll never be able to forget. It’s the same look he saw when Frank saw that Gerard was on Mikey’s instagram.

“Yeah,” Gerard breathes, wondering if Frank will shed light on what’s going on. If he’ll finally find out what’s going on with Mikey and why he won’t answer his calls. 

Frank sighs and reaches out to take his hand. “Baby, it’s been two years,” he says gently, “and I know that it’s hard to move on...it’s Mikey, but you’re letting what happened take over your life. You have to move onto the next phase of our lives or we’re never going to get past that day.”

What day? What happened?

Gerard doesn’t say anything, he’s not sure he really can. It feels like his throat is made out of sandpaper, gritting together every time he thinks about speaking. Frank sighs and gets up to come over and squat in front of Gerard. He takes his hands in his and kisses the wedding ring on his left hand. “Gee,” he says softly, “I’m going to be here for you no matter how long it takes you to...recover. I know I can’t ever ask you to move on, I know you’ll never be the same.”

Gerard wants him to just say it. What did he do that made Mikey hate him so much? What did Mikey do that made Gerard break apart like this?

But Frank moves on, quickly like they’ve had many conversations about Mikey and Frank knows not to dwell on it for long, “I think that a baby would be good for us.”

Gerard squeezes Frank’s hands and feels a tear slip down his cheek. Frank reaches up to wipe it away. “You’re in a better place now,” Frank whispers, “And I know you’d be a great father, baby, you’re the most caring man I’ve ever met.”

Gerard slips out of his chair and into Frank’s arms. He clings to Frank’s shirt, burying his face into the curve of his neck, because he needs someone to hold him and he needs to hold someone. Because he misses his brother. And he can feel it settle into his heart, heavy like a boulder. 

Something’s wrong with Mikey. 

*

Gerard would have never thought that he’d be having lunch with Bert McCracken in 2016, but here he is, walking up to a table with the blonde sipping a hot tea. 

“Hey!” He says with a grin, standing up to give Gerard a hug. 

Gerard settles in it for a moment, reliving those moments from all those years ago, before pulling away and sitting across from Bert. They’re at a cafe that Bert swears has the best quiche, and Gerard is a little giddy at the fact he gets to live in a time where Bert is excited about quiche. 

“So what’s new?” Gerard asks and listens to Bert tell him about the new album he’s working on. Gerard sips on tea and tries not to cry as Bert lets him listen to a few demos, because he can hear the pain in Bert’s voice. He reaches out and puts his hand over Bert’s and watches his face as the next demo plays. 

He knows about his friend who committed suicide. He didn’t get to be with Bert when that happened, but he had heard through the grapevine of tangled old friends. And he knew the friend, had heard the stories from Bert and how messed up he was about it. Because it had been him that delivered the fatal shot of heroin to Bert’s pregnant ex-girlfriend. 

Gerard remembers the night when Bert found out. He still sees the haunted look in Bert’s eyes, hazed and a bit delirious under whatever substances he was on to mask the pain. Gerard had pulled Bert down into bed with him and soothed his crazed hair out of his eyes. 

“Shh,” Gerard had whispered, trying to keep up with wiping the tears that were falling, “I’ve got you.”

And he stayed in bed with Bert for four straight days, only getting up to go to the bathroom or to get him to try and eat something. 

There were nights still where that image of Bert follows him into his nightmares after the images of Mikey dead bleeds away. 

“I know it’s heavy,” Bert whispers when the last demo plays. 

“It’s beautiful,” Gerard says earnestly, squeezing Bert’s hand. 

He wishes he knew how they reconnected, because Bert always got Gerard’s heart. Past all the drugs and alcohol, Bert got Gerard in the way that not even Frank did sometimes. He remembers laying in his bunk, listening to him talk about the world like he had the same pair of fucked up glasses that Gerard did. Listened to the songs that Bert liked and thought that he heard the same rhythm that his heart beat to. He always thought Bert was one of his best friends, even when they had their falling out, he always knew in the back of his head that he would drop everything for him if Bert needed him to. 

But the phone call never came and Gerard was a coward.

Bert sighs and wipes at his eyes before taking another sip of his tea. “I wanted to call you when it happened,” he whispers, and Gerard stiffens. Because why hadn’t he?

“I just wanted you to hear the record from me before we put it out, “ Bert continues, “I knew it would hit you just as hard.”

Gerard nods, but knows that there’s something he’s missing. 

“You know,” Bert whispers, leaning over to rest his elbows on the table, “I wrote a song for Mikey, but it didn’t seem like my place.”

Gerard’s world spins. 

It feels like he’s going down a spiral, like there’s a black hole that’s opened under his feet and he’s going to be sucked in. He tries to focus on Bert, who’s looking at him concerned and his mouth is moving but Gerard can’t hear anything he’s saying until, “Sorry none of us saw it coming…”

Gerard is vaguely aware that he’s moving, vaguely aware that Bert is calling after him. He knows that he shouldn’t drive, not when he can’t get his hands to stop shaking, but he gets back to his house somehow and is met with Frank standing in the driveway with his phone to his ear. 

“Yeah, he’s here now…” Frank breathes, then, “I’ll call you back.”

Gerard stumbles out of the car and Frank’s there to catch his elbow. “Baby? Hey, hey, easy, breathe for me, Gerard...come on...just like the doctor...pills?...Gerard?”

Because how many signs were there in front of Gerard this whole time? The way Mikey’s Instagram hadn’t been updated since 2014. The way the texts stopped abruptly. The way everyone looked when Mikey’s name was brought up. How Frank’s eyes looked when they talked about him this morning. The psychiatric hospital letter. The way his phone calls when unanswered.

For three days.

He should have heard from Mikey by now. 

Gerard feels Frank’s hands shaking his shoulders and then framing his cheeks. “Gerard, look at me.”

Gerard gets his eyes to focus on Frank’s wild expression. Takes in the way that Frank is searching Gerard’s face, assessing him for any immediate danger. It’s the same way that Gerard used to look at Mikey when he showed up that first year he was getting clean. The same way he checked him over to see if he was on the verge of collapse. 

“Why won’t Mikey answer my phone calls?” Gerard whimpers. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look, all of you who guessed that Mikey was dead...I didn't say you were right or wrong, so you can't be mad at me. We'll learn more about what happened and how this is going to impact Gerard's decision to stay in this timeline or go back to his own.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the chapter that started this story. I had the vague idea of Gerard going to an alternate universe where he was married to Frank, but it wasn't a full plot yet. And then I was thinking about everything that could be different in this alternate universe and I KNEW that Mikey would have to be the driving force that made Gerard question everything that he thought was supposed to make him happy. 
> 
> I know that I just updated last night, but a few comments made me want to get this chapter out quickly because I know that last chapter fucking hurt. I'm sorry, this one isn't much happier, but it answers some questions. 
> 
> ALSO: I guarantee a happy ending. I know it doesn't seem like it just yet, but it's going to happen :)

“Why won’t Mikey answer my phone calls?” Gerard repeats, a little more steady.

Frank stares back at him like he’s lost his mind, his eyes wide and his mouth slightly open. “Wh--” he starts, but he stops himself and shakes his head, “Let’s get you inside.”

Gerard doesn’t put up a fight, he lets Frank half drag him into the house and steer him into the living room. After he gets him sitting on the couch he walks into the kitchen, Gerard can hear the water running. And then he’s back, putting a cup of water into Gerard’s shaky hands. 

“Frank--”

“Drink some water first,” Frank says softly, reaching out to take the wrist that Gerard isn’t using to hold up the cup, and checks his pulse. He frowns a little, but doesn’t say anything else, just goes up the stairs. 

Gerard wants to demand answers, wants to scream and throw things and cause a scene. Anything to shake Frank out of this careful, responsible man who’s treating Gerard like he’s about to fall apart. And, well, he is. But he needs answers, he doesn’t want to be coddled right now, he wants to scream and cry until there’s snot dripping down his chin and his voice is completely gone. 

When Frank comes back down, he’s carrying a pill bottle with a deep frown. “Why haven’t you been taking your pills?”

Oh.

And Gerard finally decides,  _ fuck it _ , because what’s it going to hurt for Frank to know that he’s not from here? He’s seen enough sci-fi to believe Gerard, maybe. The worst that could happen is that he sends Gerard to the psychiatric hospital or something, right? And even if he doesn’t believe him, he can just go back home in two days, so he opens his mouth and says, “Because I’m not from here.”

Frank’s frown deepens, if that’s even possible and he sits down on the coffee table in front of Gerard. He takes the cup out of Gerard’s hand and sets it on the table before holding both of Gerard’s hands in his. “Explain that to me, please.”

Gerard squeezes his hands and takes a deep breath, releases it, then starts, “I’m from 2016, a  _ different _ 2016 where you and I aren’t together...we hardly even talk.”

Frank’s brows furrow and he looks down at their tangled hands. His thumb twists Gerard’s wedding band and says, “Why not?”

“Because I chose Lyn-z at ProRev,” Gerard whispers, and his heart breaks all over again when he sees that sentence settle on Frank’s face. 

He keeps playing with Gerard’s ring and doesn’t say anything for a moment. Gerard knows him well enough to know that he’s trying to wrap his mind around it. It’s not a hard thing to believe. Going back to that summer, Gerard and Lyn-z were inseparable off stage. They had their own world built around them, filled with silly pop songs and secret messages written that only the other would understand. 

He remembers, and can tell that Frank is also remembering, how bitter Frank’s kisses on stage had tasted. How he cornered him after soundchecks and pinned him into whatever closet or empty room they could find. Would drop to his knees and shove Gerard’s pants down, would do anything just to prove that he was the one that Gerard wanted. And it fucking broke Gerard’s heart because he wasn’t strong enough to say no and he was too cowardly to say yes. 

“So,” Frank whispers, “We’re not together?”

Gerard shakes his head and he has to look down when Frank looks up at him with heartbroken eyes. “None of this is real?”

Gerard pinches his eyebrows together. “It’s real,” he whispers, squeezing his hand. “I’m here.”

“But in some other universe, you’re not? What...what happened? I don’t--”

“--I need to know about Mikey first,” Gerard says, looking up and Frank’s face falls. 

“Oh, baby,” he whispers and pulls Gerard into his lap, which is a little hard since he’s sitting on the edge of the coffee table. Frank seems to catch on and walks them back to the couch. He pulls the blanket off the back of the couch and drapes it over them, cradling Gerard’s head to his chest.

Gerard can’t remember a time when he felt safer, and he lets himself sink into it for a moment. Just focuses on the steady beat of Frank’s heart, a little faster than normal from the stress, but it’s as familiar as his own. He closes his eyes and memorizes the feeling of Frank’s fingers running through his hair, lets out a sigh when Frank kisses his temple. 

“You...Monday?” Frank asks softly, “You got here on Monday, that’s why you’ve been acting so weird.”

Gerard clings to Frank’s shirt and nods.

“You don’t know anything before then?”

He nods again, then lifts his head to look at him. “You believe me then?”

Frank searches his eyes and then nods just barely. “I knew there was something off about you,” he whispers, “It just...it makes sense, and I know you.”

I know you. 

Gerard lays his head back down and whispers, “I need you to tell me about Mikey.”

Because Gerard had been settling into the idea of staying. He knew that Bandit was taken care of, Lyn-z was happy, and his friends were still his friends. And he was married to his best friend. But, Gerard grits his teeth together, but he’s not sure he can live in a world without his kid brother. 

“Mikey overdosed,” Frank murmurs, cradling Gerard’s head in one hand and using his other to rub soft circles on his back. 

“When?” Gerard croaks. 

“2014.”

Gerard knows he’s crying, but he can’t feel it. Because he’s not really here now, he’s back in his own 2014 staring at his brother who stopped looking like his brother a long time ago. After Mikey’s divorce, after Gerard had to peel him up off the bathroom floor multiple times, after Gerard kept telling him that he needed help, Mikey kept using until his bandmates from Electric Century and him set him up for an intervention. They had told him that he was going to a studio, but when he showed up and saw all of them there, he had looked at Gerard and started to cry. 

“I’m not here to record am I?” Mikey had whispered, sounding like the scared little kid who used to crawl under his covers whenever it stormed. 

And it had taken everything in Gerard to not just give in and bundle Mikey up in Star Wars blankets and tell him everything would be alright, because it wouldn’t be. Not for a long time. Gerard knew what this process was like. He knew how much it hurt and how hard it was to relearn everything after you got clean. Because it was almost like being born again, but instead of being an infant slowly getting used to the world, you were just thrown into it as an adult with a long list of responsibilities. Gerard remembers how scary it was to just fucking get out of bed and interact with people without the haze of drugs or booze. How terrifying it was to drive a fucking car because he was scared of everything. Without his sense dulled, it was like he had felt everything to the thousandth. Everything was heightened and made his heart race. So, yeah, Gerard knew the hell his brother was about to endure. And he would have done anything in his power to keep that from him if he knew that the other option wouldn’t kill him. 

“No, Mikes,” Gerard had breathed and opened his arms when Mikey fell into him, “I’ve got you, shh, I’m here.”

“Thank you,” Mikey had said once both their tears had dried and Gerard drove Mikey to the rehabilitation center.

Gerard took his hand and walked him into the building, squeezed it when he felt it shake. He filled out all the paperwork with his left hand because he hadn’t had the heart to ask Mikey to let go of his right. And then he hugged him and whispered, “I’ll be here. I’m not going anywhere,” when the nurse took Mikey’s wrist and slid a hospital band around it.

And then Mikey had walked through the doors and Gerard felt like his world had ended. 

But that was then. That was in another timeline where Gerard visited him everyday and saw the light coming back to Mikey’s eyes each day. Where Gerard read to him and drew pictures for him to hang up on his wall. Where Mikey told him all the gossip of the other patients. Where they started planning Gerard’s Hesitant Alien tour and what kinds of outfits Gerard should wear. Where Gerard got to take Mikey’s hand and walk him back through those doors, clean and sober. And got to watch him grow and learn from all of it. Where he got to watch him live and love and have a family. 

Something that didn’t happen in this timeline. And this, this moment here in Frank’s arms, where the vast starkness of feeling the safest he’s ever felt is met with the biggest heartache of his life, this moment is what it feels like when Gerard’s world ends. 

*

They’re sitting on the floor of their bedroom with a box of photos between them. Gerard wants to laugh at Frank because even though he tries to stay so young and relevant with the kids, he’s just as old as the rest of them and still prints out his photos. 

He hands Gerard a print, “This is one from the wedding.”

It’s of him and Mikey. Mikey’s hair is still dark from The Black Parade and there’s way more eyeliner under his eyes than there needs to be, but he’s smiling and it’s the real kind of smile that makes Gerard’s heart swell. He looks healthy here even though Gerard knows he wasn’t. Mikey hadn’t been healthy for a long time, everyone just didn’t notice. They were always too focused on Gerard’s issues or the band’s issues. He’ll never forgive himself for being so caught up in his own addiction and his own self-inflicted madness for the band that he didn’t notice his little brother was dying in front of him for years. 

Frank hands him another. “This was at Ray’s.”

And it's when they should have been making Danger Days except Gerard’s hair isn’t bright red and there’s something unsettling about not seeing the color that Gerard had thought would save him. Seeing him in the same dark colors, in the realness of not hiding in plain sight, makes his head spin. 

“Did I relapse in this time?” Gerard whispers, staring at himself in the photo. 

“You relapsed?” Frank asks softly. 

Gerard sighs, well that answers that question. Frank reaches out and circles his fingers around Gerard’s wrist. “Babe?”

Gerard stretches out on his back and holds the photo to his chest. “We were making our fourth album, the one I was telling you about?”

“The Killjoys?”

Gerard grins and nods. “Yeah, it was called Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys.”

Frank snorts and Gerard rolls his eyes, “What?”

“It just sounds like you so much,” Frank grins. 

“Yeah, well. It was,” Gerard says, then sighs, because it really was. It was colorful and loud and daring at the same time it was broken and bleak and disastrous. “I was sick.”

Frank frowns and lays down too, resting his head on Gerard’s stomach. He reaches up and laces their fingers together. “Sick?”   


Gerard sighs. “I didn’t get properly diagnosed for a long time, Frankie. I don’t know, it’s like Danger Days was a long manic episode.”

Frank’s fingers tighten around Gerard’s.

“I wasn’t eating,” Gerard whispers, ashamed that he has to admit all of this out loud again, “I was drinking--”

“You were drinking again?”

Gerard nods and whispers, “I’m sorry.”

Frank sits up and brushes Gerard’s bangs off his forehead. “Why didn’t I do anything?”

Gerard smiles sadly. “It wasn’t your place.”

“Bullshit I still would have--”

“Lyn-z didn’t even do anything,” Gerard whispers, remembering how she was almost  _ happy _ that Gerard was drinking again. Because they could go to functions without it being a big deal, Gerard could have a glass of wine and fit in with everyone else. 

“Fuck that,” Frank growls, standing up.

“Frank--” Gerard sighs, sitting up. 

Frank turns around. “I fucking told you. I told you that you would regret it.”

Gerard winces, because there it was. He had been waiting for Frank in his time to say it, but he never did. It was always there between spoken words, hanging over them like a swinging sword, waiting for them to finally give in and let the blade take them. 

“It’s complicated,” Gerard whispers. 

Frank leans back and braces himself against the chest of drawers pressed against the wall. “What’s complicated?” He asks in a rough tone. 

Gerard draws his knees up. “It’s not black and white, Frank. This world isn’t all good and mine is all bad.”

“But we--”

“Aren’t together,” Gerard nods, “But I have a daughter.”

Frank’s eyes soften. “A daughter?”

Gerard’s eyes feel hot and he closes them, but has to open them back up because all he sees behind his lids is her. “Yeah, she’s six. She’s…”

“Gee,” Frank whispers, “Hey--”

“And I was a shitty dad to her,” he continues, “I put the band first for the first three years of her life. I was trying to still be a rockstar, still trying to be the fucking martyr for those kids because I didn’t want the last thing we left in the world was tabloids that we killed that girl.”

“Baby, that wasn’t--”

“My fault, yeah I know. But it kind of was, wasn’t it? We made those songs. We made that world for the kids to live in. We created something that got them bullied over--”

“If it wasn’t us, it would have been someone else. Kids get bullied all the time, and what she did--”

“They blamed us!”

“Because we were the loudest, biggest target for them to! You think about your daughter and tell me you wouldn’t attack the biggest thing you could if something happened to her.”

“Don’t--”

“Stop and think, Gee. Why do you think you’re in a much better place in this world than in yours? Because we stopped the band when it needed it to, when  _ you  _ needed it to."

“Mikey wasn’t ready!” Gerard yells, feeling the tears and snot that he had been preparing for down in the living room. He presses the heels of his palms into his eyes and yells, sobs, screams.

And Frank just stands there and lets him. Because he hasn’t broken down yet. This Gerard,  _ him _ , he hasn’t broken for Mikey yet. And it’s not fair. It’s not fair that he has to choose like this. Frank or Mikey? But it’s not even just about them, there are so many factors, so many things that are different between this world and his that he doesn’t even know what really makes up his happiness. Because maybe that’s the lesson in all of this, that there is always going to be pain. There’s not a world where everything works out according to plan. There is always going to be uncertainty, broken friendships, death, and loss of love.

Gerard jumps when he feels Frank’s hands pulling Gerard’s off his eyes. He’s crying too, but he wipes Gerard’s tears away with the sleeve of his hoodie. “I know,” he whispers, “baby, I  _ know _ and I hate myself everyday for it. I hate that we weren’t there to put him together after that show.”

“What happened?” Gerard hiccups, leaning into him. 

Frank scoops Gerard up like he’s nothing and settles them onto the bed. He strokes Gerard’s hair and says, “He didn’t want the band to end. He was going through a lot of shit that we all didn’t know at the time. There was so much drugs and he wasn’t taking care of his depression like we all were made to believe. He was living for the band because he didn’t have to just be Mikey on stage.”

“Did he tell you all of this?”

Frank nods. “Yeah it was one of the last conversations we had. He was drunk and he called me, he did that a lot. In the end, he called and rambled a lot.”

_ I don’t even know you anymore. _

“And he was telling me how you started the band to save his life, and yours, and he said that it wasn’t fair to end the band. Because your life had been saved, but not his. He felt like he was still falling.”

Mikey had told him something similar back when they were still in the Paramour. Mikey and him were sitting in the heavy room, the room where they where they could say all the ugly things that they kept inside--like some demented therapy that did more harm than good. 

“We can stop,” Gerard had whispered. 

It had been right before Mikey would leave with Tracy. Mikey’s eyes were sunken in, the hollows of his face more gaunt and the darkness under his eyes was from lack of sleep instead of makeup. 

“No,” Mikey had muttered, shaking his head, “I’m not done with the band yet.”

“What do you mean?” Gerard asked, “It’s tearing you apart.”

“I need it to,” Mikey said, “I need it to rip out all the ugly and then it’ll heal me.”

“Mikey--”

“It saved you already,” Mikey bit out, “You got clean. You made peace with the fact you were a drunk asshole while our grandma was dying. You got better. I’m not.”

And Gerard had felt himself tear apart for Mikey. Felt that ugliness that he had been examining the whole writing process creep out of his mouth and slither towards Mikey. Because he had been right. Gerard had been getting better and Mikey had been getting worse. The darkness had to live in someone, and Mikey had taken it on for them. 

“I was supposed to save him,” Gerard whispers to Frank, “I was supposed to take him to the desert.” Let him stand under the sun so the darkness wouldn’t be able to reach him. And maybe that’s why he painted his hair red and dressed Mikey in bright colors.

But when he started seeing the darkness creep back into their lives. When the album’s numbers weren’t reaching what the label wanted. When the kids didn’t understand that they were the same band that wrote The Black Parade. When Frank started having babies and moving on without him. Gerard took the darkness back so Mikey wouldn’t have to. 

And he didn’t care that it almost killed him, not until he came home on a break and saw Bandit had grown into a toddler that he hardly recognized. Then he wrote the post that would break the band. 

“We didn’t know, Gee,” Frank says, “He hid it so well. Even you didn’t see it.”

Gerard shakes his head, because he would have seen it. It’s his fucking brother. His own flesh and blood and heart and mind. Mikey is him just in another body. He knows Mikey’s addictions and demons because he’s looked at them in his own mind. Gerard would have seen it all over Mikey. Which means that Gerard hadn’t cared. And while it tears Gerard’s heart to shreds, it seems like the more logical answer. 

Gerard had finally gotten everything that he wanted, and he didn’t want to take the darkness from Mikey and let it ruin him. He had Frank and that’s what he thought mattered most, because at the time that was what he equated his happiness to. 

“How did it happen?”

Frank doesn’t say anything for a long time, until Gerard lifts his head and repeats himself. Frank closes his eyes and says, “No one found him for two weeks.”

Gerard scrambles out of Frank’s lap and leans over the bed, throwing up.

*

Gerard’s in the empty tub with a cigarette in his hand. There’s a few extinguished ones down by the drain. He’s been chain smoking for the last hour, thinking over and over how he didn’t check in on Mikey for  _ two weeks _ . 

“You found him,” Frank had told him once he got Gerard cleaned up, “the police had to pull you off of him. It was...I’ve never, I still have nightmares.”

Two weeks. 

Frank knocks softly on the door. “Gee? Come out and try to eat something. I made soup.”

The last thing Gerard wants to do is eat. He doesn’t want to do anything that a living person should be doing. Not while his brother is dead.

But he gets up and puts out the cigarette, before opening the door. The room still smells sour, but Frank has everything cleaned away. The photographs are gone and there’s no visual evidence that Gerard was sick. Frank takes his hand and leads him slowly down the steps like Gerard is going to snap in half on the way to the kitchen. He feels like he might. 

Everything feels different knowing his brother isn’t here. The chair under him feels like it’s not even holding him. The soup is hot because it makes his tongue ache, but he can’t really comprehend what hot is. Can’t taste it. Can’t tell that it’s filling him. 

The doorbell rings and Gerard looks up at Frank, puzzled. He gives him a small smile before going to answer the door. When he comes back, Ray Toro is with him. 

Gerard gets up from the table and staggers to him. 

“Hey, bud,” Ray whispers, hugging him, “Heard you’ve had quite the week.”

Gerard huffs out a laugh and behind him, he can hear Frank chuckle softly. 

Frank pours him a bowl of soup and the three of them sit at the table. Ray tells Gerard what he’s been doing since Gerard’s timeline diverged in 2007. And Gerard actually smiles throughout Ray’s stories, because they’re pretty much the same as in his timeline. There’s something reassuring and comforting about that. About Ray in general, because Ray has always been a constant in Gerard’s life. Back when he would hang around the house with Mikey, Ray was steady and sure, even as a kid. And then when they started the band he was always the voice of reason. Always the one to make sure they worked on the music and improved. Always was the one who Gerard ran to when he needed advice, the paternal kind that would warm his insides and make him feel like the world had just given him a hug. Ray always made things seem less scary, and he understands why Frank called him over. 

“What’s Mikey like in your time?” Ray asks softly, and Frank jumps a little as if he hadn’t even thought to ask. 

Gerard rests his head on his hand and lights a cigarette, ignoring the look Frank shoots him. “He’s married to a beautiful woman that’s really turned him into the best version of himself,” he says, then chuckles, “Even if I think he looks like a tool with his fucking hats.”

Ray laughs and even Frank grins. 

“But he laughs so much, and he smiles more than I’ve seen since we were kids. And,” Gerard chokes a little, “He’s a dad.”

Frank’s eyes are glassy and he looks at the table. 

“Yeah, he’s got a daughter,” Gerard continues, “And he’s so great with her, you know? And... _ fuck _ , how didn’t we see?”

Ray reaches out and takes Gerard’s hand. “He’s not in pain anymore.”

Gerard takes a drag and nods, blowing smoke and whispering, “But he’s not in pain in my time either.”

Ray smiles gently. “Well, can’t you just think of that then? That somewhere in the world, in some time, Mikey Way got the happy ending he deserved.”

Frank looks up and smiles a little. “I like the sound of that,” he whispers, “I...I’ve been trying to wrap my mind around this all day. Why you came here, what does this mean or what it could mean for me. And I think it’s to give me some sort of peace, that Mikey is happy in another universe, even if I can’t see it.

Gerard doesn’t say anything, just finishes his cigarette. And the longer he doesn’t say anything, the more Ray and Frank’s smiles fall into something bleak. They’re starting to realize there’s something that Gerard isn’t telling them. 

For once Gerard has the answer and everyone else in this timeline is clueless. 

“What?” Frank whispers.

Gerard stabs out the end of his cigarette in the empty soup bowl. 

“Two timelines can’t happen at the same time. While I’m here, the other one doesn’t exist,” Gerard says, letting that settle in for the guys. 

“So--”

“So Mikey’s just dead. There is no alternate universe he’s living in, because that universe doesn’t exist while I’m here.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you to everyone who has been reading, commenting, and leaving kudos. You all are amazing!

Frank sits back against Gerard’s chest and sighs. It’s been a long day and they’re both in bed before eight. Gerard holds Frank to him, breathing him in and trying to remember this feeling. Because they both know what’s going to happen next.

Gerard is going to return to his own timeline for Mikey. 

“I don’t understand,” Ray had said at the kitchen table, “So that timeline is gone? It just doesn’t exist anymore, you’re stuck here?”

Frank had winced at “stuck here”, because Gerard didn’t really like the sound of that either. Like being here was a sentencing or something, like being married to Frank wasn’t worth the heartbreak. If there was no way to get back, Gerard thinks he could have made it work. He would have eventually found peace in losing Mikey, especially if he had Frank to be there with him. 

But there was a way. “I can go back,” Gerard whispered, “I can go back if I want to.”

“What am I like?” Frank whispers now, bringing Gerard’s hand to his mouth to kiss each of his fingertips, “In your timeline, what am I doing?”

Gerard takes his other hand and runs it through Frank’s short hair. “Kind of the same. You still live in Jersey even though the rest of us moved to LA”--Frank snorts-- “And you still have your band.”

Frank nods and bites gently on Gerard’s index finger. “What else?”   


Gerard swallows and says, “You married Jamia and you have three kids.”

Frank presses his face into Gerard’s palm and exhales loudly, like it hurts to breathe. “Am I a good dad?” He whispers. When they were younger, Frank never talked about being a dad, but Gerard could just tell by looking at him that he would want kids one day. Family was always important to Frank, he always talked about his dad and his grandfather with an air of pride, his back straightened and he held his head high. 

He had been so wild back then. He was a tornado on stage and that energy didn’t dissipate once they stepped off, if anything it just ramped up again until he could get back on stage with his Pansy. But once he had those twins, that energy was channelled into something more mature. Not still, but just more intentional. More protective. More loving. Gerard didn’t think that fatherhood changed him into another person, it just gave him something more substantial to focus that energy on. Like Frank had been flailing around his whole life looking for something to keep him steady. Those kids rooted him to this world. 

“The best,” Gerard says without a beat.

He chuckles, “You can’t possibly know that. You said we hardly talk.”

Gerard slides his hands down to press against the beating of his chest. “I know your heart,” Gerard whispers.

Frank turns in his lap and kisses Gerard. It’s slow, like Frank is trying to remember every bit of this as well. “What happens when you go back?” He whispers, “Do I not exist anymore? Will I go back to your time with you? Will I remember you, remember us?”

“I don’t know how it works,” Gerard admits sadly, nipping at his bottom lip. 

Frank traces his thumb over the curve of Gerard’s jaw. “I just don’t understand why this is even happening.”

“You were in an accident,” Gerard tells him, and he feels Frank tense in his arms, “And I went to go see you.”

Frank doesn’t say anything, so Gerard continues, “And it was awful and wonderful at the same time. Because I hadn’t seen you in so long and it felt like we were the same, you know? Like we never left the tour bus, you looked so familiar to me. But at the same time you were a stranger to me,” Gerard frowns and kisses Frank harshly, almost punishing, “And it hurt.”

Frank cups Gerard’s cheeks and kisses him just as bruising, their teeth collide and Gerard’s jaw starts to ache. “I want to hate you for doing this to me,” Frank says, and it almost comes out like a sob, “But I can’t.”

“I’d stay,” Gerard whispers, stroking his cheeks, “You know I would if it wasn’t Mikey.”

“I know,” Frank murmurs, kissing him again and again, “That’s why I can’t be mad. I know how much you need him.”

“It doesn’t mean I don’t need you,” Gerard breathes, pressing Frank back into the mattress and climbing over him. 

“I don’t want to say goodbye,” Frank whispers.

“Then don’t,” Gerard says, capturing his next sentence in his mouth and swallowing it for later. He doesn’t want to forget these moments. The way these sheets smell like them, how they feel against his kissed skin, how they look against Frank’s tattoos. He doesn’t want to forget the way Frank’s skin heats as he brushes their clothes off. Wants to memorize the way his eyes grow dark when Gerard swirls his tongue around his nipple. 

Gerard has never been great at goodbyes. He snuck out the morning of the band leaving for their first tour so that he wouldn’t have to hug his mom bye. He called his fiance when he broke the news to her that he didn’t want to get married anymore. He posted the band’s break up online because he was too big of a coward to say it to their faces. 

And so he doesn’t say goodbye to Frank either. Instead he stretches him out across the mattress like he’s his last supper. He presses his lips and hands across his skin as if he could imprint himself onto him, just in case he does wake up in Gerard’s timeline. He wants him to remember what it felt like to be loved this thoroughly. He doesn’t want Frank to forget what it felt like to be held down while Gerard took him in his mouth, swirling his tongue around the head of his cock before sinking down, breathing in the salty scent of him as the air in the room got heavier with their pants and gasps. Doesn’t want him to forget the way he lost control of the noises that ripped through his throat, begging on the verge of sobbing. Wants him to remember how they both shook and held each other’s gaze as Gerard rocked into him. How Frank cradled his jaw in his hands and brought their foreheads together, mingled their breaths and synchronized their heartbeats. 

Because Gerard hasn’t felt like he was separated from Frank in a long time, even after all the years of not seeing him, if he closed his eyes and let the barriers slip away, he was back against Frank’s chest in his bunk. He was back on stage with him sharing a secret smile. He was pressed against a NSYNC poster being kissed by a man who would wait decades for him to realize that he was the love of his life. 

“Open your eyes,” he whispers when Frank’s eyes flutter shut and he tilts his head back, mouth open from the ghost of a moan. 

Frank’s hazel eyes attach back to his own and Gerard cups his cheek and whispers, “Don’t look away.” He doesn’t want to waste a moment he has left. 

Frank looks up at him, and something in him breaks as if he’s just now realizing that this is the last time he’s going to see Gerard. That this is the last time they’ll make love. The last time he’ll have his hands on him, will be able to see Gerard with this level of reckless abandonment. 

He surges up and captures Gerard’s mouth with his, drinks him in like he’s a man lost in the desert that Gerard never took him to. And for a moment time doesn’t matter. They blur together and when Gerard licks at his lips, he can taste the bitterness of Gerard leaving him. He’s always leaving him. For Lyn-z. For the end of the band. For Mikey. It doesn’t matter, this will always be their fate. There was no twisting that into a happy ending for them. 

Frank had said that the universe knew that they belonged together, but Gerard doesn’t think that’s true. Because if the universe had that much to say about it, Gerard wouldn’t be swallowing another goodbye. He wouldn’t be tasting the tears salting Frank’s lips.

Gerard feels the burn settling in his groin, can feel his limbs starting to lose their feeling and start to shake around Frank. Frank’s almost gone too, his head tossing back and forth against the pillow, his fingers digging into Gerard’s ass. “Not yet,” Frank begs.

Gerard doesn’t want this to be over yet either, but he can’t stop. He’s too far gone to slow his erratic hips, can’t bring himself to put off their tangled release galloping towards them without mercy. 

“I know, I know,” Gerard whimpers against Frank’s jaw, letting the stubble there burn into his sensitive lips. “I know.”

He reaches down to take Frank’s cock in his hand and only has to stroke a few times against Frank’s moans, “No, no, not--” and then he’s striping them in his hot, pearly release with a broken sob. 

Gerard drives into him with staggering movements, feels Frank squeezing his ass, stroking up his back, cupping his chin. “You’re never leaving me,” Frank whispers hoarsely, “I’m always going to find you. Whatever universe you're in, you’re mine.”

Gerard comes, blinding and shaking like it’s taking all the hope and love from his body, leaving him limp and lifeless against Frank.

“I know,” he whispers against Frank’s heart.

*

Frank brushes his lips sleepily against Gerard’s ring. “Don’t go to sleep,” he murmurs, his own eyes closing, “I don’t want to waste any time I have left with you.”

Gerard smiles sadly at him, brushing his still damp hair off his cooling forehead. “I’m still here,” he whispers. Frank smiles softly and Gerard only has to wait a few moments before his breathing evens out and he knows that Frank is asleep. 

Part of him wants to stay, can imagine him staying here in bed with Frank and hiding from the rest of the world. He can picture what their life could be like. He sees their kids, running around with the fucking ugly dog that they have and squealing when Frank would chase them and lift them up in the air. He can see family dinners where he shares questioning looks with his kids while Frank loads their plates up with whatever vegan dinner he’s inflicting upon them for that evening. There’s lazy Sunday mornings in their future, where Frank nuzzles against Gerard’s neck and slips his hand into the waistband of his pajama pants. Holidays stretched out on the sand of some beach as he watches his kids build sandcastles and his husband wade out into the ocean, coming back to rain salt water and sun drenched kisses on him. He can see Frank growing old in front of him, dark hair greying and tattoos fading against his skin. Can picture the way the skin around his wedding band would wrinkle and mirror his own.

They could have that future. But the world is cruel and is making Gerard choose someone other than Frank again. He’s going to have to walk away from the love of his life again. Going to have to return to cold nights alone in his studio with nothing but the memories and a thousand  _ could have beens _ to keep him company at night. 

Gerard traces Frank’s face with his fingertips, feather light to keep him from waking up. He holds his fingers over his open mouth, feels the air tickling his skin. This Frank existed. His Frank. His husband. This life was real and he’ll always be grateful for what time he had with him. 

But then Gerard slips out of bed. He goes to his closet and runs his fingers over the fabrics one more time before getting dressed. He walks to Frank’s side of the closet and presses his face against the shirts, inhaling, before taking one of the jackets and draping it over his shoulders. He goes to the door, but hesitates. He turns and leans against the frame, just to take one more look before he leaves quietly. 

Because Gerard is still not good at goodbyes. 

Gerard isn’t surprised to see the old woman on the bench when he approaches. 

She sighs and says, “I thought I told you to wait a week.”

Gerard slumps in the seat next to her, pulling out a cigarette. “I can’t live without my brother.”

She nods and pulls out a chocolate bar. “I thought you might say that,” she comments, snapping the bar in half and offering him some. 

Gerard smiles sadly and takes the chocolate, breaking it apart and placing a square on his tongue. “I love him,” Gerard whispers sadly, staring down at his wedding band. “Why do I have to choose between them?”

“Because the choices we make a difference,” she says, “Each choice alters your life, no matter how big or small they might seem. They  _ all _ matter. Your choice to choose your Frank over Lyn-Z is just as important as deciding whether or not to answer your brother’s phone call.”

Gerard winces and pops another square of chocolate on his tongue. “Can you just take me back?”

“Is that what you want?” She asks softly, “You can have a little longer here if you want.”

Gerard thinks about it, but he knows that he wouldn’t be able to enjoy his time here without being able to have Mikey to share it with. He thinks about the happiness he feels when Mikey tells him about his daughter or how much his cheeks hurt from smiling when he saw Mikey standing at the altar, waiting for his bride. 

He knows that there’s different kinds of love. There’s the kind he has for Frank. Where it burns in his heart and lights him on fire, spreads through his veins and wakes up his sleepy limbs. The kind of love where he looks at Frank and feels settled in his own skin, in a way that he’s never felt before. He looks at Frank, touches him and knows that’s where he belongs. 

But then there’s the love that he has for Mikey. His kid brother who he’d do anything for. Who he’d take the darkness for in a heartbeat, let it swallow him whole if it meant that Mikey got his happy ending. Because Mikey was his flesh and blood. His past and his future. Mikey was made up with the same stuff that Gerard was, only better. Mikey was the better version of Gerard, the version that deserved to see the light of day, not wilt away into nothing but photographs and memories. 

“I’m sure,” Gerard whispers. 

The old lady looks sadly at him and nods, patting his knee. “Finish your chocolate, dear.”

Gerard sighs and slips the last of the chocolate in his mouth and smiles softly at her. “Thank you, for everything.”

She nods once and removes her hand to place it on his cheek, “I hope you find the happiness you’re looking for.”

*

Gerard doesn’t remember falling asleep. He doesn’t remember anything after his conversation on the bench. 

But he wakes up. 

Gerard  _ wakes up _ and sees the soft striped pattern of Mikey’s pillow under him.There’s a moment where he feels hollow and cold. Because he wakes up and Frank isn’t pressed against him. And the reality of his choice sets in his bones, weighing him down into the mattress. He presses his face against the pillow and lets himself wallow in it for a moment, giving him the few minutes to grieve the life he could have had with Frank. He pulls the jacket that he took back with him, inhales the warm and spicy scent that’s Frank. And Gerard chokes down the sob that’s threatening to crawl out of his throat because under the scent he can smell himself too. Because there’s something utterly heartbreaking to know that they were so intertwined.

But when he wipes his eyes and focuses back on the fact he’s laying in Mikey’s bed.

Mikey.

He bolts up and searches for the phone that he fell asleep listening to the other night. It’s dead, because of course it is. He rushes out of bed, his legs getting tangled in the blanket and falling hard on his elbows on the floor. 

“Fuck,” he mutters, but he scrambles up and hurries out the bedroom door and down the steps. He hears his mom call out his name in question, but he’s already out the door. 

He doesn’t really know what the fuck he’s doing, all he knows is that he has to get to Mikey. And so he goes to the bus stop and takes public transit, something he hasn’t done in a decade, to get to the airport. When he gets there he’s not even coherent as he buys the next plane ticket to LA and makes his way through security. He probably should buy a phone charger and charge his phone while he waits to board the plane, but he almost needs to see Mikey in person before he hears him. After everything he’s been through these last few days, he needs to be sure. 

The plane ride is the longest five hours of his life. He knows he’s being snappy with the plane attendants, but he feels like he’s going to come out of his skin. He’s so wired and shaking, gripping his hands together. He feels the maddening combination of heartbreak and hope. 

When he arrives, he flags down a taxi and rushes out Mikey’s address. 

Gerard and Mikey hadn’t spent more than three days apart from each other, whether in person or on the phone. Even when his mind was warped in the Paramour, when he was angry at Mikey for leaving, he still reached for him when he came back for each band practice. Still clung to him before he left to go back to Tracy every night.

_ I’m not afraid to walk this world alone _ . 

Gerard had never told a bigger lie, and it hurt everytime he had to sing that line on stage. Killed him to look at Mikey, standing rooted as always, plucking the heavy, steady beat that echoed their shared hearts, and tell him that he’s not afraid to live in a world without him.

Because he could never live without his brother. Even if it meant he got to spend his days with the love of his life, he could never be without Mikey.

And then he’s standing outside of Mikey’s door, ringing the doorbell until it opens and Mikey is standing there with a puzzled expression. 

Gerard chokes back a sob and falls on his knees in front of him. 

“Gerard?” Mikey exclaims, sinking down and wrapping his arms around him and hugging him close, “Hey, what’s going on? Are you alright?”

Gerard shakes his head and presses his face against Mikey’s chest, holds his ear to his heart and listens to the beating. 

Alive. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a shorter chapter, but I needed to end it there. We're pretty much at the end here, there's one more chapter, maybe two depending on how I want to split it up.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> UGH I get so obsessive when I get to the end of fics. I know ok? I fucking know that I just updated yesterday, but here's another one. Enjoy :)

Mikey had to hold Gerard for an immeasurable time on his porch while Gerard sobbed into his shirt. There was a part in the back of his mind where he knew how this looked. It was very similar to the way he had broken down when he finally admitted that he had relapsed. Mikey had held him then too, murmuring the same reassurances that he whispered to Gerard on the porch, “Shh, it’s ok” and “I’m right here” and “Whatever it is, I’ll help you.”

When Gerard’s tears had run their course and he was reduced to nothing but a hiccuping mess, Mikey wiped at his face with the sleeve of his shirt and helped him stand up. He put his arm around his waist and led him into the house, sitting him at the kitchen table and starting a pot of coffee. 

Kristin comes down with bleary eyes. “Mikey?”

He goes to her and Gerard tries not to cry again as Mikey presses his lips to her temple and whispers something against her ear. She nuzzles against him and then strokes his cheek once before going back up the stairs. Gerard misses that already. 

Mikey stands by the doorway for a moment, hesitating, no doubt trying to gauge what level of fucked up Gerard is right now. When he comes over to sit in front of Gerard, Gerard reaches out to take his hand, pressing his fingers into his pulse. 

“Gee,” Mikey whispers, looking down at Gerard’s fingers, “You’re scaring me.”

“You were dead,” Gerard blurts out, and he winces a little. 

Mikey always took what Gerard said and found truth in it. Even his drunken rambles from when they were younger, because he knew that Gerard would never lie to Mikey. When Gerard whispered to him under the haze of beer that they would be standing on arena stages one day, Mikey believed him. When he took him out into the desert and told him that he would still save him, Mikey believed him. 

Mikey nods. “In a dream?” He asks, but in a way that doesn’t sound so sure of himself. Mikey’s eyes dance over Gerard’s face, and he can tell that Mikey knows this is different. That something really fucked up happened to Gerard. 

“No,” Gerard whispers and he covers his face with his other hand. 

The coffee pot beeps and Mikey squeezes Gerard’s hand before going to fill up two mugs. He sets one in between Gerard’s hands, his own hands cupping around Gerard’s to bring some warmth and comfort. “Take your time,” Mikey murmurs. 

Gerard takes a deep breath and lets the heat of the coffee and Mikey’s hands still his trembling hands. “I wasn’t in this world,” he says softly. 

Mikey doesn’t scoff and raise and eyebrow, he just nods gently and waits for him to continue. 

“I--” Gerard sighs and shakes his head, laughing bitterly, “I woke up in Frank’s bed.”

“But not really?” Mikey asks.

“No, really,” Gerard says, pulling his hands away to drag them through his hair. “I was in an alternate reality or something. I was married to Frank I--” he looks down and the ring is still wrapped around his finger. He frowns at it, if this is some sick joke from the old lady, it’s not funny. 

Mikey’s eyes widen at seeing the ring. “Oh.”

Gerard nods. “Yeah. It was...it was really jarring.”

Mikey snorts and it makes Gerard’s head snap up. “What?”

Mikey rolls his eyes. “You were married to Frank, I can just imagine the clusterfuck that was,” then he erupts into giggles, “oh God, let me guess. You two had like a million dogs and ate tofu.”

Gerard cracks up a little. “There was only one dog.”

Mikey holds his sides and laughs harder. Gerard closes his eyes and lets the sound wash over him. As much as it hurts to be without Frank, he knows he made the right decision. 

“What else?” Mikey presses, “Did you guys live in Jersey?”

Gerard rolls his eyes. “Like Frank would live anywhere else.”

Mikey beams at him, then it falls. “Bandit?”

Gerard reaches out and takes Mikey’s hand, feeling the hole in his chest stretching back open. “She was there, but not our Bandit. That world--it was, nothing was the same. Not really. She was still Lyn-z’s daughter, but with a different father. But--Mikey, I swear to you she knew who I was.”

Mikey squeezes Gerard’s hand. “Of course she did, Gee. You’re still her dad.”

Gerard leans down to rest his forehead against their tangled hands. “I think the lesson in all this was that I don’t appreciate you all enough. I don’t love you enough.”

Mikey places his other hand on the back of Gerard’s head. “You love more than anyone I know,” he whispers, then sighs, “But you let it consume you until you’re paralized with it.”

Gerard nods, feeling the back of Mikey’s hand drag against his forehead. “You were dead.”

Mikey wraps his hand around the back of Gerard’s neck. “I’m here now.”

Gerard and Mikey spend the early hours of the morning smoking and drinking coffee as the sun starts to rise. He tells Mikey about the band ending after Madison Square Garden, and he watches Mikey’s eyes dim at the thought of not doing Danger Days. 

“That’s difficult,” Mikey whispers, “Because I know what that album did to you.”

Gerard sips his coffee. “It wasn’t the album, Mikes, I was just unwell.”

Mikey just refills Gerard’s mug and says, “You and Bert were friends again?"  
  
That’s another sting that’s making itself known. Gerard wishes he had longer to explore what happened between him and Bert,and he wonders if it’s too late in his time now to reach out to him. “Yeah, I think maybe I’ll give him a call later.”

Mikey smiles warmly at him. “I think he’d like that.”

And Gerard tells him about the easiness of his and Frank’s house. How nothing was marble and clean, there was life spread out all over the counters. Warm bread baking in the kitchen, paint splatters on the coffee table. There were shoes kicked off by the front door and little paw prints stained into their couch. 

Mikey laughs at Gerard’s description of Ray, because he sounds the same. And then his face falls when Gerard abruptly stops, because that day when Ray came over was really hard. 

“How?” Mikey asks quietly. 

Gerard looks at Mikey bleakly. “You know.”

Because there had been enough close calls for it to be believable that Mikey would have died from an overdose. 

“I’m sorry,” Mikey whispers, looking down at the table, “I know I put you through a lot.”

“You’re here now,” Gerard echoes. 

*

Gerard went home when Kristin came down with Rowan. Mikey reached for Gerard, concern still hanging in his eyes, “You can stay if you want.”

Gerard had shook his head and said, “I need to be alone for a bit.”

Mikey held his gaze then said, “I’ll be over later.”

Because the whole experience had shook Mikey up too. Gerard didn’t tell him many details about his death in the alternate universe, but he could see Mikey filling in the gaps of Gerard’s story. He knew that their relationship had been broken wherever it was that Gerard came from. He knew that it would take a little bit for Gerard to feel comfortable in their dynamic again. 

When Gerard gets home the stark difference between his house and the one he shared with Frank hits him like a ton of bricks. He doesn’t even know where he should go. Nowhere feels like home, so he just hesitates by the door. He immediately wants to go back to Mikey’s. 

Instead he goes back outside and sits on his porch and lights a cigarette. 

And because fate is cruel, his phone rings with Frank’s picture on the screen. For a moment, Gerard wonders if _his_ Frank is calling him, if he woke up in his house and doesn’t recognize it either. 

“Hello?” He answers softly. 

“Hey,” Frank says, and Gerard’s heart sinks, because it’s the same Frank that he left for Lyn-z. “Do you want to grab some lunch?”

“Oh,” Gerard whispers, and he stares at his cigarette before saying, “I actually went back home”, then he clarifies, “to LA.”

There’s a pause then, “Are you alright?”

And, _fuck you, Frank_. Fuck him for knowing Gerard still. For knowing that he is not fucking alright right now, that he’s falling apart and he’s not even sure how he’s supposed to tell Frank what’s been going on. Not just with the last week, but for the past decade. 

“No,” Gerard whispers, leaning forward to brace his elbows on his knees, “No, I’m not.”

Frank pauses again then says, “Yeah, me neither.”

This was the conversation they should have had in his living room, the one that was almost a week ago for Gerard and only yesterday for Frank. “Tell me,” Gerard says softly, because he’s still selfish with Frank. After all this time and everything he’s learned, he’s still pulling from Frank because he knows that Frank will give. 

“I--” Frank laughs bitterly and Gerard hears the telltale sounds of him lighting a cigarette, “I sort of want to hate you.”

_I want to hate you for doing this to me_

“I know,” Gerard whispers.

“But I don’t,” Frank continues. 

“I know, Frankie.”

Frank laughs, that silly little giggle that he does when he’s nervous. “Fuck you,” he says in between giggles. 

Gerard breaks into a smile too, despite it all. “I love you,” he says quietly. 

Frank doesn’t pause this time, he just says, “I love you,” right back. Gerard presses his face into his thighs and bites back the tears. 

“Do you remember that party back at Eyeball?” Gerard asks softly, “That room with the NSYNC poster?”

There’s silence then, a soft laugh. “Yeah, yeah, I remember that.”

“Did you know you were going to have to wait this long for me?” Gerard asks quietly. 

Gerard listens to Frank smoke for a while before he asks in a small voice, “Am I still waiting for you?”

Gerard thinks about it for a moment, because they could be together in this timeline if they wanted to. Gerard thinks irrationally for a moment about hopping on yet _another_ plane and flying back to Frank. To stand on his front door and beg for another chance. He starts going through the possibilities of merging their families, and what would that look like? Because it’s different from the life he just left where he and Frank were starting at the same point. Now, it’s messy. He has Bandit and Frank has three kids...and a wife. He can’t ask Frank to uproot all that for him. Gerard is selfish, but he’s not heartless. 

“Gee?”

“I don’t know,” Gerard admits quietly, “I think too much has happened for us. It’s not like we can go back.”

“So where do we go from here?”

Gerard lights another cigarette, and stares at the wedding bands still on his finger with a sinking feeling. “Forward,” he whispers, because that’s all they can do.

“I meant with us.”

“You’re my best fr--”

“Fuck that,” Frank says, “It’s not enough. Not this time, I’m not going to sit around for another ten years and wait for you to have another crisis. This is it, Gerard. Right now.”

Gerard presses the heel of his palm against his forehead. “What do you want from me?” He breathes, completely exhausted. 

Frank laughs again, almost near hysteria. “I want you to stop being a fucking asshole for a minute.”  
  
“No, Frank, what do you _want_? What is there at this point? I’m a broken man nearing forty, I’m a washed up rockstar with a divorce and a six year old who barely knows me. I-”

“I know what a fucking mess you are. I loved you when you were snorting coke off dirty toilet tanks, you think I give a shit that you feel inadequate right now? You think I have a fucking choice? I _don’t_ want to feel like this. I--” he cuts off and Gerard’s insides twist at the soft sniffle that breaks through the phone, and then Frank’s voice comes back shaky, “When I saw that bus coming at us, I thought I was going to die. And you know what I thought of?”--there’s another sniffle and a pause of Frank trying to hold it together-- “I thought, this can’t be it. My life can’t end yet because I’m still not with you.”

“Frank--”

“It was supposed to be us. It was _always_ supposed to be us.”

“I know,” Gerard whispers. 

“Stop saying that. I know you know, you’re just a fucking coward.”

“What do you want to do?” Gerard bites out, “Leave your wife and uproot your kids?”

“Who says we’re living in LA?” 

Gerard snorts. “You’re an idiot.”

Frank just laughs, but there’s still no humor in it. 

“You love Jamia,” Gerard says softly.

“I do,” Frank swallows, “so much.”

“And it’s not fair to your kids,” Gerard continues, even though it’s breaking his heart. Even though he’s putting the nail in their coffin, he says, “I can’t keep being selfish with you.”

He imagines Frank sitting outside on his porch as well, away from the life he’s talking about leaving. He wonders if he’s picturing Gerard filling that house instead. If he can see the same future that Gerard has dared to hope for. 

The future he knows they won’t ever have. 

“I fucking hate you,” Frank whimpers, and Gerard can hear the tears streaking down his face, the same way he can hear his heart breaking on the other side of the country. 

“I know, baby,” Gerard whispers.

*

Gerard sits on the porch for a long moment after he gets off the phone with Frank. They had cried together for a while, and Gerard wished that he had been with Frank so that he could have held him. But, at the same time, he’s glad that they’re on separate ends of the country. Because Gerard probably wouldn’t have been strong enough to do the right thing. 

And then they had just talked for hours, catching up and filling in all the small talk gaps that they had created over the years. Frank told him about the band and recounted all the silly stories of being on the road. Gerard hadn’t really missed touring much, he was content with the fact that he wouldn’t be up on stage again or squished on a bus. Frank made him miss it though. He wanted to laugh on the floor of a bus at three in the morning while the rest of the crew was snoring softly in their bunks. He wanted to make Frank laugh so hard that grape soda came out of his nose. He wanted to climb into his lap and kiss him until their breaths tangled and he forgot that he was his own person. He wanted to climb inside of Frank and never come back out, wanted to nestle among his nerves and fall asleep to the beat of his heart. 

Gerard told him about the comics he was working on. Frank already knew about Umbrella Academy, he was there at the beginning of it, when it was still just a few sketches on notebook paper with a handful of ideas. Frank had leaned against him and asked about the character’s names, asked why they did what they did, what was the goal? Much of Umbrella Academy was written because of Frank. Not a lot of people know that, even when Frank busted into his Dark Horse meeting, it was for him. 

Gerard brought it up during their conversation and Frank had laughed, “I was so drunk.” And Gerard had laughed, harder than he had in years, because he remembers who utterly ridiculous Frank had been. 

“I was so nervous,” Gerard had whispered. 

“I told you I’d take care of it,” Frank murmured.

Here’s what happened. Gerard had this meeting with Dark Horse for Umbrella Academy and he was fucking nervous. Like, almost breaking his sobriety nervous. And Frank knew it, had tried to calm him down with hugs and small, hidden kisses on his neck, but it didn’t work. 

“Just go in there and do your thing,” Frank had whispered, “You’ll be fine.”

“They’re going to think I’m a fraud. That I’m just some rockstar trying to move into the art world when I have no business being there.”

“You have a degree in cartoons.”

“Cartooning--”

“Whatever,” Frank had said, “Why are you nervous then? You get on stage in front of thousands, what’s a few dudes around a table?”

“Because this is real to me. This is something I’ve wanted to do since I was a kid,” Gerard had admitted softly.

And Frank had kissed the tip of his nose and said, “I’ll take care of it.”

Taking care of it meant that Frank bursted into the meeting drunk off his ass and started drawing a ghost--boozy--and talking about some made up story he had in mind. He played up the cliche rockstar that Gerard had been afraid he’d come across as and gave Gerard a wink when he was escorted out of the meeting. But Gerard was laughing so hard, so giddy afterwards, that he didn’t even think about the creative team telling him no--didn’t even consider it, because all he thought about was how he was going to climb all over Frank when he got back to their hotel. 

Needless to say, he got the deal.

“What are you doing out here?” Mikey asks now, walking up the driveway with a small package in his hands. 

Gerard blinks at him, the setting sun bright in his eyes and making Mikey look washed out like he’s a ghost. For a split second his heart freezes, but Mikey reaches down and lets Gerard’s fingers slide over his pulse. 

“I was on the phone with Frank,” Gerard tells him softly, then frowns at the package he’s still carrying, “What’s that?”

Mikey looks down at the box in his hand. “I don’t know. It was left at your gate.”

Gerard rolls his eyes and takes the package. “Don’t you know better, you don’t pick up stange packages by the gate. It could be a bomb from a psycho fan.”

Mikey shrugs. “I shook it and it was fine.”

“You--you _shook_ it? What the fuck, Mikes?” Gerard mutters, “I just got you back, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t die already.”

Mikey rolls his eyes and walks into the house. “Were you still this dramatic in the other universe?”

“Ha ha,” Gerard drawls, following him into the house, shaking the package as well. Whatever it is inside doesn’t sound very big. 

They go into the kitchen that’s too big and clean compared to Frank’s kitchen. There’s no piles of papers on the kitchen counter, no sink full of coffee mugs, no window full of herbs. It looks cold and unlived in. Gerard sighs and falls into the seat at the table. “You didn’t have to come check on me, I’m fine.”

Mikey leans against the counter and raises an eyebrow. “Sure. I’m still staying the night.”

Gerard is grateful, he’s not sure he could sleep alone after the last few days he’s had. A night ordering bad take out and watching even worse movies with his favorite person sounds like the balm he needs to heal right now. 

“What’s in the box?” Mikey asks, going over to Gerard’s ridiculously expensive coffee maker. He misses Frank’s simple one from Target. 

Gerard gets up to get a knife so he can cut open the tape. Mikey comes over after he starts the coffee and watches as Gerard pulls out a chocolate bar. 

“What the hell?” Mikey asks, with a raised eyebrow. 

Gerard smiles a little, knowing who it’s from, but he takes the notecard out of the bottom of the box anyway. 

_The past is easier to digest with a little bit of sugar._

Mikey hooks his chin over Gerard’s shoulder and reads the notecard as well. “Maybe you were right, we do have some crazy fans.”

“It’s not from a fan,” Gerard murmurs fondly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter is the END!
> 
> I'm already working on the next fic. How do you all feel about zombies? ;)


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THANK YOU to everyone who has read along, left comments and kudos, bookmarked, subscribed, and found me on tumblr! You all are so amazing and make writing so much fun. 
> 
> Here's the happy ending I've been promising. I was pretty happy that no one seemed to have predicted what I had planned ;)
> 
> Maybe, this will make listening to Millions not hurt as much.

Mikey orders curry from Gerard’s favorite Thai food, the kind that always makes him drink a gallon of water because he loves the spice. Gerard sits on the loveseat so that Mikey can have the bigger couch, but Mikey just squishes next to him on the smaller of the sofas, slurping his noodles loudly. 

“I miss the weird stores we would find on the road,” Mikey says after a while. 

It takes a beat for Gerard to understand what he’s talking about before he nods. “Yeah,” he says softly, then with a smile, “I had the best closet in the other world I was in.”

Mikey snorts. “You mean you didn’t wear the same torn grey hoodie everywhere?”

Gerard still has Frank’s jacket on, he doesn’t think he’s going to be able to take it off for a while. Mikey notices the way he pulls it tighter around him and raises an eyebrow, “What did Frank say?”

“I didn’t tell him,” Gerard frowns, “Why would I?”

Mikey’s quiet for a moment, besides the annoying slurping noises from his noodles. “I think you need to tell him,” he says around a piece of broccoli. 

“Why?” Gerard sighs, “What good will that do?”

Mikey’s eyes light up. “Maybe it’s like magic and once you tell him, the worlds will merge or whatever.”

Gerard stares at him blankly. “I’m never asking you to help with any story lines for my comics. Ever. That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”

Mikey rolls his eyes. “Is not. You’re the one that decided to make a terminator Spider-Man.”

“She wasn’t a terminator Spider-man, she was--” he starts then sighs dramatically when he sees Mikey’s shoulders shake with laughter, “I fucking hate you.”

“Not true. You turned down Frank sex to be with me,” Mikey sing-songs. 

Gerard steals the bite of chicken he was about to put in his mouth. “Yeah,” he says, chewing, “What was I thinking?”

Mikey shrugs, trying to maintain the teasing, but Gerard can see something breaking in his demeanor. “Hey,” Gerard says softly, taking the bowl of curry away from Mikey and setting it on the coffee table, “I will always choose you.”

Mikey doesn’t meet his eyes as he says, “I don’t understand why you would do that.”

Gerard frowns and takes his hand, stares at the wedding band on Mikey’s own finger. He’s so damn proud of this kid, he always has been. Even when Mikey was at his lowest, Gerard always thought the most of Mikey. But there’s a stronger sense of pride now. Knowing what he knows _could_ have happened, and seeing how Mikey came out on the other side here. With him. 

“What do you mean?” He asks, squeezing his hand. 

“You’ve always loved Frank,” Mikey says gently, “And then you had this perfect life with him and you gave that up.”

“It wasn’t perfect. You weren’t there,” he reminds him. 

Mikey huffs and squeezes Gerard’s hand back. “I wanted that happiness for you. The way you told me about your life with Frank, the way you lit up...Gee, I haven’t seen you look like that in years.”

Gerard shakes his head. “It doesn’t matter. I won’t let you sacrifice yourself for my happiness, that’s not how this works.”

“Isn’t it?” Mikey bites, and Gerard winces. Before he can say anything, Mikey says, “You always looked after me. You _always_ did whatever you could to make sure I was happy, regardless of what it did to you. It’s not healthy, and it’s not fair. To either of us.”

“What are you talking about? I was the absolute _worst_ to you! Or do you not remember 2004? I know you were on drugs too, but fuck, Mikes. What kind of brother does that?”

Mikey cups Gerard’s face in his. “The kind that was hurting. You’re allowed to hurt.”

Gerard gets up from the couch and stands in front of him. “You sound like Frank.”

“Good, you need to hear it. When are you going to stop sacrificing your own happiness for everyone else?”

“Are you kidding me?” Gerard nearly shrieks, “I’m the most selfish person on the planet!”

Mikey scoffs, “To who? Me? You literally just left Frank for me--”

“Mikey, stop.”

“Or the kids? The whole fucking world you bled dry for over and over again just because you thought you had to save every sad--”

“I said stop it!”

Mike glowers at him and bites out, “ Frank?”  
  
“I strung him along for years and--”

“You cut him loose when it mattered the most,” Mikey says, “He’s not here is he? He’s still with his wife and kids and you--”

“Don’t want him to be! I want him here with me! I want to be in his stupid house with that ugly fucking dog but that’s not ever going to be our life!” Gerard yells, then he picks up one of those stupid decorative books that no one ever reads from his coffee table and throws it at the wall, “ _Fuck_!”

Mikey comes up behind him and puts his hand on Gerard’s shoulder. “You’ve given me everything, Gee. You drug me out of Jersey and built this band with me, _for_ me,” he says, then he pulls Gerard into a hug, “And you got me clean and healthy so that I could be the man I needed to be for my family. So that I could have a family and...Gerard, I owe you my fucking life. You’ve given up your life for me, why won’t you let me do the same?”

Gerard hugs him tighter and presses his face into Mikey’s shoulder and breathes him in. Breathes in the familiar scent of home, hot summer suns, and salvation. “Because I’m the oldest,” he says stubbornly. 

Mikey huffs a laugh, that sounds like a hidden sob. He doesn’t cry though, Gerard’s shed enough tears for the both of them, he just hugs him and sighs, “Tell me what I can do then. How can I make this better?”

Gerard thinks about telling him to buy him a plane ticket and send him back to Frank. He thinks about telling him to burn everything he has of My Chemical Romance so that the past can’t haunt him anymore. Thinks about telling him to get in the car with him and drive out to the desert and try to find meaning in it once more. 

But instead he says, “Split that chocolate bar with me?”

Mikey snorts and steps back, ruffling his hair. “Sure.”

Because Gerard is a morbid fuck, and Mikey is a bad influence, they wind up in the basement going through the tubs of old My Chem memories as they break apart the chocolate bar between them. Mikey holds up the pimp coat that Gerard had bought in Europe, the one with all the fur. 

Mikey can hardly stop laughing enough to dodge the stack of flyers that Gerard throws at him. The papers scatter over the floor. Dates that seem like a lifetime ago staring up at them, haunting and comforting in the same way. Haunting in that those dates held the sort of reckless youth that he’ll never know again. Comforting in the way that he’s made it to this day. He stayed alive this long, loved this long even when he had every right to grow bitter and only see the ugliness in the world. 

But, Mikey is beautiful. Laughing with his sun kissed cheeks pink as he holds up photos of them with various forms of bad hair. Gerard has a hard time looking at them sometimes, because he knows what’s going on behind the smiles. But some of them are genuine happiness. Like the one of Gerard grinning as he hugged Frank at Christmas, back when Frank had that stupid red and black hair. Or the one of him and Ray sitting in a car back at the beginning of everything, smiling so big because they hadn’t seen heartbreak yet. There’s one of Mikey holding a koala and Gerard makes fun of his hair, to which Mikey just rolls his eyes and says, “let it go already.”

And then there’s his jacket from The Black Parade, along with dozens of notebook pages of the original lyrics of some of the songs. He always thought about boxing them up and sending them to Frank. He thinks maybe he’ll do that now. Thinks that now is the right time for them to finally talk about the past and try to heal from it. 

Mikey ends up falling asleep on the carpeted floor wearing one of the feather boas that Gerard used to wear on stage. Gerard goes through the last box alone, pulling out his Party Poison mask. He smiles sadly and puts it on, going into the bathroom and staring at himself in the mirror. 

His hair is obviously not the same cherry red it had been in 2010 and his cheeks are a lot fuller than they had been, but he still feels like he’s pulled back to that time. Pulled back to one of those last conversations he had with Frank before the last of their shaky relationship came crumbling down. 

They had been somewhere in the midwest, sitting in a parking lot while the rest of the guys raided a gas station for snacks and sugary drinks. Frank had been trying to quit smoking ever since becoming a dad, but always bummed one of Gerard’s cigarettes.

“What do you think is next?” Gerard had asked him, and smiled when Frank laughed. 

“You’re always onto the next thing. Why can’t you ever just bask in what you’ve already created?” He asked, flicking ash onto the cement. 

Gerard shrugged, digging his nail into the filter of his cigarette. He hadn’t wanted to tell Frank that he was feeling out the ending there. Gerard knew that he couldn’t keep going at the rate they were, that he was due for a breakdown at any moment. 

“Doesn’t this feel like an ending to you?” Gerard whispered.

Frank frowned at him and reached out to take his hand. “I don’t ever want to stop doing this with you. Or the rest of the guys. This is what I want to do until I’m eighty.”  
  
Gerard had laughed, but it hadn’t made him feel as warm as it usually had when Frank made him laugh. “That’s something I’d like to see,” he had said sadly, knowing it wouldn’t happen. 

Frank scooted closer to him. “Where is this coming from?”

“Are you proud of us?” Gerard asked instead. 

Frank flicked his cigarette out into the parking lot and turned towards Gerard. “I’d do it all again, in a heartbeat.”

Gerard started down at Frank’s lips. “All of it?”

Frank smiled softly and cupped Gerard’s chin, his thumb resting on Gerard’s bottom lip. “Well, I might change a few things.”

Gerard had wanted to kiss him then. Had to ball his hands up to keep from reaching out for him, his breath coming out in short spurts. 

Frank watched, always watched the internal battle going on behind Gerard’s heartbreaking eyes. “Wouldn’t you?” Frank asked, “Go back?”

Gerard never answered him that night. He had opened his mouth, but Mikey had come over with an armful of snacks, dropping little colorful packets of candy behind him. “They didn’t have sour skittles, but I got gummy worms.”

Gerard takes off the mask and goes back to toss it back into its box. He shakes Mikey awake enough to get him to walk up to the spare bedroom. He tucks him in like he used to when Mikey was sick and ruffles his hair before he goes back to pick up downstairs. 

He gets the storage containers put away and then picks up the chocolate bar wrapper. There’s a square left and he puts it on his tongue, letting it melt in his mouth as he walks back up the steps. He hovers by his bedroom, but the vast empty bed makes his stomach drop, so he climbs into the guest bed with Mikey. 

Mikey instinctively shifts over so that Gerard can settle in the blankets. He stares at the ceiling for a long time, listening to Mikey’s breath even out into a slumber. 

_It’s not bad to want to change the past_.

Gerard closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, thinking about everything he has to be thankful for in his life. Mikey being alive. Bandit. Being able to call Lyn-z tomorrow and listen to his daughter call him dad. He could call Ray tomorrow and see if he wants to jam, maybe throw a song together. He misses making music with Ray. Sometimes Ray was the only person who could put together the way he felt in notes and chords. And he’d call Bert for sure. He wants to hug him and tell him that he’s proud of him for everything he’s accomplished. 

His life isn’t as bad as he thought it was. There’s things he wishes were different, but he has no reason to be this unhappy. But he is, and it makes him sick sometimes. Because he has a family, even in it’s broken form, he has Lyn-z and his daughter. He has Mikey and his parents. He has Ray and Frank. He has people in his life who he loves and who love him back. 

_It doesn’t mean you don’t appreciate what you have._

There was still a part of him that wishes he could go back and do it all again. Pick Frank. Watch over Mikey. Hug Bert. Support Ray. Call his parents more. Not let the media take away his message to the kids. He would appreciate the people in his life more. He would make the right choices.

“Can’t sleep?” Mikey whispers. 

Gerard turns and looks at him. Takes in the profile of him, how he still looks like a kid to him sometimes and then other times he looks like he’s the older, wiser brother that’s supposed to protect him. 

“Would you go back and do it all over again?” Gerard asks instead.

Mikey turns towards him, lifting his head on his hand and frowns at the blanket. “There’s things I wish I had done differently, but I’m happy with my life.”

He looks up at Gerard, and his eyes soften, because he can tell that’s not the answer that Gerard was looking for. He holds his gaze, resolution settling behind the eyes that mirror his own. “I’d go back,” he says softly, “I’d do it all again with you.”

*

Gerard doesn’t remember falling asleep. 

But he’s been shaken awake. “Gee,” he hears Mikey. 

“Five minutes,” he mutters, feeling like a teenager again. 

“ _Gerard_ ,” he says in that tone that always shakes Gerard to the core. The kind of tone that means, something is fucked up.

Gerard opens his eyes and blinks a few time, trying to adjust his eyesight because there has to be something fucking wrong with his eyes. Because Mikey is sitting above him, only his hair is black. Gerard sits up and frowns at him, because he still looks like _his_ Mikey, but there’s something off. Something _way_ off. 

“You should look in the mirror,” Mikey whispers. 

Gerard looks around and they look like they’re in a dressing room. The kind that they used to get ready in on tour all the time. He stands up on shaky legs and goes to the vanity that’s nestled in the corner. As soon as he steps into the mirror, he runs his hands through his cropped, bleached hair. “What the fuck?” He whispers. 

He looks back over at Mikey, who looks like he’s having a hard time deciding what to say next. He opens his mouth, but the door opens to the stage crew. One of them starts saying something to Gerard, but he can’t focus on him because he can see Frank out in the hallway, stretching his arms and jumping around with pre-show jitters. He looks over at Mikey who is getting a bass put over his shoulders and then suddenly they’re being pushed out the room. 

Gerard’s still trying to piece together what the fuck is happening when he sees the old lady dressed like a janitor, sweeping in the hallway they’re coming down. She gives him a wink as they pass.

_The past is easier to digest with a little bit of sugar._

Gerard’s blood runs cold, and he can still taste the chocolate on his lips as he’s getting ushered to the side of a stage, the lights starting to dim and the excitement of the crowd rushing towards him. 

He doesn’t have time to think of anything else as he’s getting shoved onto the stage. The opening chords to “How I Disappear” shake him awake though. And it’s like he’s never left 2007, he dives right into the song and goes through the motions. He puts his hand on his hip and sutures across the stage, looking out at the audience and trying to place where they are. 

He finally realizes what show this is when they dive right into “The Sharpest Knives” Gerard looks around and eyes Frank. And it fucking hurts to see him like this, but in the best way. He’s so young again, they all are. They have years of mistakes ahead of them and not a single one has touched Frank yet. He looks up from his guitar and at Gerard, eyes heavy and a smirk on his lips. This is the Frank that Gerard broke, he never saw him this free again after this show. 

But Gerard is here now. And he knows how this can end. That he can make sure that they never have that fight that tore them beyond repair. He can wake up in Frank’s bed ten years from now, with their ugly dog and cluttered kitchen. 

So, when Frank climbs up on the amp and drapes himself over Gerard, Gerard cups his face and kisses him. Frank stops playing and hangs on him, melting like he doesn’t believe this is really happening. This kiss is nothing like the kisses that they shared when he was married to Frank. This kiss is overdramatic and sloppy. It’s sleazy, Gerard sliding his tongue down Frank’s throat in the reckless way he hadn’t let himself kiss in all the years after this. But this is now. This is again. They are young and messy and real. 

“I love you,” Gerard whispers and Frank’s eyes widen as Gerard pushes him off and bounces across the stage, eyes still glued to Frank. Frank falls to the ground and plays harder than Gerard has ever seen him. 

Gerard looks over at Mikey, with his bright eyes and toothy grin. The kind of smile that he used to wear before the darkness took them. Because this is another chance for him too. Another time for him to be on stage with this band that he created with his brother. A chance for him to save Gerard, in a way that he never felt he truly did. Because Gerard had seen the disappointment in Mikey’s eyes as he looked at him when he thought Gerard wasn’t watching. The same look he saw yesterday when he realized that Gerard had given up a life with Frank so that he could still have Mikey. But now he could give him this. And Gerard would let him, because Mikey was here with him this time. Mikey knew the paths laid out ahead of them just as much as he did, and they could make the right choices together. 

Mikey catches his eye and beams at him. Because for once, Gerard and him are in the same place.

In the same light. 

Under the flashes of the stage, under Frank’s glittering eyes, under Ray’s smile. 

Where the darkness can’t touch any of them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I HATE writing endings. HATE it. 
> 
> Anyway, that's it! I'm off to go write about zombies now <3


End file.
